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Unifying influence

Sir: Talk of a Scottish republic (`Not so bonny Prince Charlie', 24 October) suggests wider questions. The Tory as defined by Dr Johnson was `one who adhered to the ancient constitution of the state, and the apostolic hierarchy of the Church of England', whereas Whig was `the name of a faction'. Since Margaret Thatcher, the Tories have been part of international capitalism. The `ancient constitution' was a mixed constitution with elements of democracy and elements of monarchical government.

The idea that evidence of popular support is any proof of good government will not be credited by anyone who lived in the Germany of Adolf Hitler: the Nazis certainly did not lack that. There is, however, everything to be said for a monarchy exercising its unifying and non-partisan influence at critical moments of the democratic process. The idea that the Queen should be merely a media figure, like Diana, Princess of Wales, points to ruin. Those who care only to please the media will perish by the media.

A real Tory party would be considering how to strengthen the monarchy.

CH. Sisson Moorfield Cottage, The Hill,

Langport, Somerset

Sir: Anyone else but the Queen, whose nationality was so constantly misrepresented, would complain to the Race Relations Board.

Why should she be called German? George II, born in Hanover in 1683, was the last of our monarchs not to be born in this country and our present Queen Mother, from whom the Queen derives half her ancestry, is obviously of British extraction.

Republicans like to pretend that the Windsors have no royal Stuart blood, but Prince Charles descends no fewer than 22 times over from James VI of Scotland, who inherited the English throne as James I in 1603. (Sir Iain Moncreiffe, preface to Royal Highness: Ancestry of the Royal Child, Hamish Hamilton, 1982).

Jennifer Miller 2 Heathview Gardens, London

Not guilty

Sir: Richard Lamb (Letters, 24 October) does not tell us what would have stopped German forces from capturing airfields in France and the Low Countries for a Blitz on this country just as swiftly in 1938 as they did in 1940. This lingering controversy over Munich is evidently one of those unlikely ever to be settled conclusively and so what appears to be Frank Johnson's somewhat tentative opinion seems preferable to what I find the unduly emphatic, but by no means convincing, verdict proffered by Richard Lamb.

Irfon Roberts 3 Cockshut Road, Lewes, Sussex

Sir: Richard Lamb reminds me that Hitler seldom spoke the truth. But Hitler's 1945 views about Munich were neither truth nor lies - merely opinion. And with the benefit of hindsight.

The entire case against Munich rests upon a number of unlikely suppositions: that the Czechs would have fought valiantly; that the French would have advanced into the Ruhr; that the Soviets, busy murdering their senior Officer Corps, either could have or would have honoured their Czech alliance; and that the German generals would have successfully arrested Hitler. But the subsequent fighting qualities of the Czechs (1939, '48, '68) and the French (1939-40), not to mention the duplicity of the Soviets and the failure of the 1944 Generals' Plot against Hitler, hardly support this case. Indeed, even Chamberlain's most relentless critic among modern historians, Williamson Murray, largely dismisses all these arguments.

But what is truly astonishing is that Richard Lamb, who voted against fighting for King and Country in the notorious Oxford Union debate of 1934, and, in his own words, was 'enthusiastic' for the misbegotten Peace Ballot of 1935, should have the gall to condemn Chamberlain for failing to risk war in 1938 when he had no army and a mere fledgling air force. While Mr Lamb was indulging his youthful follies, Chamberlain was campaigning for greater rearmament and being denounced by the Peace Balloteers as a warmonger.

Michael McAllen 5 Tudor Avenue Roydon, Diss, Norfolk

Mellow Men

Sir: How right Matthew Parris is (Another voice, 24 October). It always seems to me unjustifiably high-principled when politicians are criticised for making U-turns. I remember in the distant Thirties standing for election as president of the JCR at Worcester College, Oxford against a long-haired, unshaven, left-wing, anarchic extremist called Woodrow Wyatt. (I say this in no way to blacken the father of my favourite Petronella.) I was an ultra-conformist, Mary Whitehousian Tory, son of a father known to his brothers as Colonel Blimp.

We both mellowed in advancing years, Woodrow Wyatt turning almost into a Thatcherite devotee while I no longer advocate bringing back the stocks.

Eric Dehn 5 Trelawney Road, Bristol

Dog eats dog

Sir: Stephen Glover, in his fourth column on the Guardian in as many weeks (Media studies, 24 October), has decided we are not crooks. We are grateful. It is certainly an advance on his fellow Guardian-obsessives, Paul Johnson and Taki, who evidently believe that we are. It is notable that Johnson's fastidious endorsement (`Sensational!') tops the cover of a book of Pooteresque fantasies just published by yet another Guardian-obsessive, Jonathan Hunt.

But Mr Glover's tone of reasonableness is deceptive:

1) Although he concedes that Hunt is an obsessive who has 'wild' theories about the Guardian, Mr Glover goes out of his way to praise his 'impressive' results as an investigative journalist. The sole quoted example of this is that Hunt has 'discovered' that Hamilton only tabled nine written questions about Al Fayed.

This is a discovery? Does he think the Guardian didn't 'discover' this four years ago or that Sir Gordon Downey didn't also 'discover' it and weigh it in his official inquiry? Does he think Dale Campbell Savours's pattern of questions was not also drawn to the attention of Sir Gordon?

Hunt's draft book - complete with all the wild material Mr Glover cannot bring himself to believe - was given to the Select Committee considering the Hamilton case more than a year ago. The only thing Hunt's published book adds is a glimpse of his extraordinary leaps of logic as he strains to prove a giant conspiracy of lies and deceit by Guardian reporters and editors. Thus we discover that Hunt states as a matter of certainty that I personally tampered with evidence upon the astonishing 'discovery' that the document was printed in a different font from other documents. Yes, really. That sensational.

2) By contrast the Guardian's attempt to find out who Hunt was and what he was up to is characterised - in both Mr Glover's text and your headline - as 'underhand'. How so? Mr Glover doesn't say. It just is. Can Mr Glover imagine a head of any organisation not trying to find out what on earth was going on if he learned that a book was about to be published which made charges (to quote Mr Glover) `so extraordinary that one rubs one's eyes in wonder that any publisher should have agreed to commit them to paper?' Would any editor not think it his duty to make some enquiries about the author?

Were our enquiries 'underhand'? Hardly. Our modest enquiries found that Hunt had spent only a short time as a journalist after a life spent in the motor trade. That seemed worth pointing out, given the advance billing he was getting (mainly, it must be said, in The Spectator). Mr Glover makes the same point himself. And we unturned the fact that he had been fined for VAT evasion which -- given his vitriolic assault on the ethical standards of others - also seemed noteworthy. We openly interviewed Hunt and his helpmate. Hunt, by contrast, distributed his main findings without once speaking to anyone at the Guardian.

Mr Glover points out that we didn't mention Hunt's nomination for a local television award. This is true. Nor did we report the unflattering opinions of his former colleagues at Granada, including his boss who told us he was a `fucking nutter'.

On the disputed amount of Hunt's VAT fine Mr Glover reports Hunt's version together with a guarded comment from an inspector involved in the case. He did not share with your readers the basis on which our reporter arrived at our version -- which also relied on official Customs sources though we went to the trouble of faxing it to Mr Glover. Nor did Mr Glover mention that Hunt denied to us that he had ever been fined - something we also took the trouble to point out.

On the basis of all this Mr Hunt is pronounced to be 'impressive', if a bit wild. But the Guardian is as ever 'underhand'.

3) Mr Glover concedes that Al Fayed's allegations against other MPs turned out to be true, though he inserts the caveat `albeit less damaging than against Mr Hamilton'. But this caveat is wrong. The allegation against Tim Smith MP - that he took large sums of cash in return for lobbying - was true and precisely as damaging as the one against Hamilton. That, too, was a factor we, Sir Gordon and the Committee all considered.

Alan Rusbridger Editor, Guardian, London