Face-to-face working

SIR – I am now retired as an active company proprietor, but if my staff had been “working” from home (Letters, February 19), it would have been devastatingly inefficient. The benefit of face-to-face communication between colleagues is immeasurable. If I were still in business, I would pay a bonus – maybe even 20 per cent – to those staff who worked from the office. Mac Fearnehough

Holmesfield, Derbyshire

SIR – Many employers have reduced their office space, so if all their employees arrived on any given day, they couldn’t be accommodated. Howard Buttery

Whalley, Lancashire

SIR – A browse through engineering job vacancies in this country will show numerous positions requiring “10-plus years of experience managing multimillion pound projects”, yet they offer the same as graduate salaries at European firms. I started my career in the Netherlands for nearly double what was being offered in Britain for more senior positions. Dr Zander Rewse-davies

Smilde, Drenthe, Netherlands

SIR – Mattie Brignal (Money, February 18) says that in 1997, when Gordon Brown was Labour’s chancellor of the Exchequer, “little attention” was paid to his removal of the tax relief on pension contributions.

I disagree. Attention was certainly paid by the thousands of people with private pension plans – which should have made a generous addition to state pensions. The change has forced my partner and me, now in our 70s, to take part-time jobs to supplement our income, as our pensions are worth about £100 per month.

Mr Brown’s move never went unnoticed, and for it now to be recognised as an “enormous mistake” merely adds insult to injury. Indeed, at the time, both unions and employers, as well as hundreds of others – myself included – wrote to him to protest.

For many, Mr Brown will always be remembered as the chancellor who sold our gold reserves and reneged on his promises to working people. Pam Farquhar

Ludlow, Shropshire