Letters

The ONS found that more than a quarter of university graduates earn lower wages than non-graduate employees who have completed an apprenticeship. They showed also that the lowest-earning 40% of graduates are more likely to work in part-time roles than non-graduates with an apprenticeship.

Philip Collins confirms the main findings of the review that the prime minister commissioned and which I undertook in 2010 (“Spend more on children and less on pensioners” Mar 4). Most children’s prospects are determined before they start school, hence the importance of what happens during the first five years (the foundation years) of life. But, if we are to open up the life chances of the poorest children, expenditure needs to be more targeted than Collins suggests. First, any growth in the education budget should be skewed towards the foundation years. Second, to see how effective this spending is, we need a set of indicators measuring readiness for birth, toddlerhood and then school.

Surely it is now time for the government to look at the different routes into a gambling addiction, for instance, the mega advertising campaigns and online activities, and then act to curb them.

A cross-party group of MPs and Peers, which I chair, recently reported on the extent and causes of hunger over the past year. A disturbing finding from this exercise was the apparent increase in the numbers of people working on a zero-hours basis, or at the mercy of an employment agency, for whom a low and irregular income does not cover market prices for food, rent and utilities. Many of these workers, in order to keep a roof over their head and avoid being cut off by their energy supplier, are seeking help from their local food bank.

The challenge for politicians is to strike a new deal with the electorate that can open up a new, buoyant source of revenue.

What about playing to Jeremy’s strengths rather than emphasising his weaknesses? Two qualities stand out. The first attraction is that he is genuine. What he says now he has maintained ever since I have known him. Many of his passions I share. The disagreement is in the way he puts these utopian goals as if they were an immediate programme for government. We also need to be trusted with the keys to 10 Downing Street.

Clare Foges rightly draws attention to the havoc that gambling can wreak on mainly poorer households’ budgets (Tories must rage against the betting machine, 25 January). It isn’t one of the main drivers of household poverty, but where poverty does exist gambling almost certainly compounds it.

Joe Haines is right (The Micawber Syndrome, 6 January) about my nomination of Jeremy Corbyn. I hoped we would get a debate and that is what we certainly have not had.

Frank Field urges the government to act quickly to provide clear pension advice to women