Parliamentary standards

To The Daily Telegraph

As a woman who worked for an MP in Parliament 15 years ago, I listened to Roger Gale, the Conservative MP, on the BBC’S Today programme last Saturday with utter dismay. To suggest that 15 years ago sexual harassment and abuse were more acceptable in Parliament shows a total absence of awareness.

Back then, the floodgates were simply more tightly closed, and we young women knew it. We made sure our bodies were covered, avoided ever being in a lift, corridor or room alone with certain notorious MPS, and remained silent when endless remarks were made about sexual conquests and jokes shared about female MPS. We knew implicitly that we were powerless in this boys’ club, and too often felt like objects or ornaments. If the tide is turning on that culture then it’s to be celebrated, and Parliament will be all the better for it. Caroline Robinson, Sheffield, South Yorkshire

To The Times

No minister has resigned over the appalling negligence of the Grenfell Tower tragedy; no former minister will apparently ever be held to account over the cover-up after the Hillsborough disaster; and Tony Blair will seemingly never be punished for the disgracefully misleading dossier that took us into the Iraq war, which cost hundreds of thousands of innocent lives and destabilised the Middle East. And yet Michael Fallon’s hand touching Julia Hartley-brewer’s knee is enough to end the career of one of the few moderately competent politicians in this Government.

If Theresa May’s chaotic handling of Brexit and her ludicrous appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary have not already made a laughing stock of this country, the absurd way in which Fallon has been forced to resign soon will. Stephen Porter, London

To The Times

The outgoing Defence Secretary has resigned as a minister because he felt that he had not upheld the standards of the armed forces. Should he not also have resigned as an MP, or is he saying that the kind of behaviour he is accused of is acceptable on the backbenches? Gary Rawlinson, Marlborough, Wiltshire