Make more poppies

I WROTE that the collective noun for a group of colorectal surgeons should be a clench. A reader suggests a pile.

TO mark the First World War centenary, the moat of the Tower of London is to be planted with 888,246 ceramic poppies, one for each of the British and Empire dead. Later this year the poppies will be sold at £25 each for military charities. I foresee trouble. We all understand the significance of the 888,246 figure but I bet millions more Brits will want to buy these souvenirs. I hope someone has got plenty in reserve. Everyone who wants a ceramic poppy should be able to buy one. The last thing we need is a limited edition creating an artificial shortage and being sold online for obscene profits. There was quite enough war profiteering the first time around.

THE dramatic footage of Tara the tabby saving a little boy in California from a vicious dog may be the only recorded case of a cat doing anything useful. This could be that rarest of things, a heroic, altruistic and self-sacrificing cat. But as a tabby owner I suspect that either this cat automatically attacks any dog venturing into its territory or was simply being possessive (That's my little boy. If anyone's going to bite him, it's me).

IS the crop of celebrity trials for "historical" sexual abuse only the tip of an iceberg? Don't you wonder how many long-forgotten fumbles have been resurrected and quietly settled out of court with the production of a birth certificate, showing the girl was 14, and the payment of large sums of money?

BE wary, too, of assuming that all sex abuse is historical. If it happened then, common sense tells us it is happening now.

IN APRIL last year Ed Balls admitted he had driven at 56mph in a 50mph zone on the M62. The shadow chancellor attended a driver awareness course. He said he had no points on his licence and "would like to keep it that way." Who can blame him? Driver awareness courses are supposed to pick up mildly erring drivers and improve their road skills. So much for the theory. Two months later Mr Balls was fined £350 with three penalty points for jumping a red light. And on April 5 this year he was nicked yet again, this time for driving off after bumping another car. So where is the evidence that a driver-awareness course has made Ed Balls a better driver? In fact, where is the evidence that these courses, now taken by more than a million drivers every year, have proved more effective than the traditional punishment of a fine and penalty points? As far as I am aware, there is no such evidence. So we are left with a system which produces no measurable benefits and seems to be motivated largely by profit. These courses have grown into a £100 million-a-year industry and traffic law is being enforced partly to provide customers. This has the makings of a major scandal. Every time I write questioning these courses, I expect either a senior police officer or a course organiser to refute my arguments and assure us all is well. Still waiting.

I MENTIONED too briefly the bottle of 18-year-old Spanish wine I was given for my birthday. It deserves more. There is something about good, ancient plonk that brings out the generous, sharing side of us. My wife is teetotal so who should I share it with? My oldest friend? The new neighbour? The old neighbour? And then I opened it, poured a glass, sniffed it, slurped it, swallowed it. It was magical. So I shared it with me.