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■ Have you noticed there seems to be a theme running through My Pet Peeves? Misuse of our wonderful English language, grammar and awful Americanisms. Also bad manners and lack of respect are high on the list too.

What we need is a campaign to highlight the importance of English, grammar and handwriting in schools. I know young people who cannot write a letter and have the handwriting of a four year old.

Brenda Lea, Penrith, Cumbria

Ed: Well, let’s firstly not be too hard on people, like me, who attended UK schools in the 1970s and 1980s.

I’m afraid the Government dropped grammar from the curriculum and as a result of that poorly conceived experiment, there are now even teachers who struggle to teach grammar since it went back on the curriculum in 2014.

It was my mum who bought home tuition grammar books and would test me on my nouns and verbs after school. I can remember her sighing and saying it was like trying to get blood out of a stone.

However, I also think teachers have one of toughest jobs in this country, especially in areas where little ones are coming to school too tired and hungry to learn.

What we need are free school meals for ALL primary schoolchildren, thousands more teachers, and school buildings that don’t leak or drop asbestos slabs on their heads. Roll on July 4…

■ Artist LS Lowry was a strange man, not one to go for “close relationships”. His matchstick men and women of Manchester in the Lowry painting (May 22) remind me of zombie-like people today walking around on their mobiles, or crowds of passengers at stations who have nothing to say to each other and try to avoid human contact.

Linda Tilton, Wirral, Merseyside