Maybe in five years’ time a sick child presenting to the accident and emergency department will be assessed promptly by a senior doctor and, if admission is necessary, moved quickly to the ward for treatment by a well-trained nurse. Maybe this would even save money!Dr KEVIN SOUTHERNPaediatric Research FellowSt James’s University Hospital, Leeds. Sir: Your choice of the Tour de France as a metaphor for the election campaign (leading article, 18 March) may be more apt than you think. In the 1996 Tour, Miguel Indurain, the five-times winner of the event, predicted that he would win, but was beaten by a fit young upstart I live in hope. CARLTON REID
Editor, `Cycle Industry’Newcastle upon Tyne. Sir: The news that a further 2.5 million homes could be able to choose their gas supplier in October (“Lang speeds up gas price competition”, 18 March) is hailed as a victory for the industry regulator.

All the evidence is that the new gas suppliers in the domestic market are courting predominantly middle- and higher-income home-owners who pay for their fuel by direct debit. Competition is based solely on price, with no evidence of more efficient use of energy, or of action to promote this.
Meanwhile, consumers who use prepayment meters for home heating continue to be denied access to the benefits of competition. They may be predominantly on low incomes and living in the poorest housing, but they do pay in advance for their gas. Yet on average the new gas suppliers charge these people 20 per cent more for their gas than a customer on direct debit (and up to 34 per cent more).Those who find it hardest to pay are charged the most.

This is the unacceptable face of competition.ANDREA COOKDirector, National Energy ActionNewcastle upon Tyne. Sir: To my knowledge, Hamish McRae (“Slimmer governments under pressure to do more with less”, 18 March) is the first publicly to identify one of Europe’s best-kept secrets: the economic prowess of the Netherlands It is said to set an example to Germany and France. Why not to the UK?

The Netherlands has signed up pragmatically to Maastricht. That also means the Social Chapter -yet its unemployment is lower than ours (a fact Tory propaganda could never acknowledge).
Even though in general wages are higher there (I envy my opposite number in the Netherlands, who earns at least a third more than I do, while costs and household expenditure are scarcely different), its per capita inward investment is, if not higher than ours, then pretty close to it – something else the Tories carefully conceal from us by concentrating on the inward investment total.Apart from less dogmatic national management and a decentralised political system, some reasons for the Netherlands’ success evident to any visitor are a better-educated population, a sense of citizenship as partnership at all levels of society, and pleasure taken in the present and the potential of the future – all in sharp contrast to what we find in Britain. Quick – look the other way or we may have to learn a few lessons.RODEN RICHARDSONLondon SE7. Sir: “Dap” can also refer to the speed at which a person or object travels – “He went at a good dap”.

I have never heard it used of dropping crockery, which does not mean that R Pugh (letter, 18 March) is wrong, but I never use “drop” in that context. The correct word is “fall”, as in “You mind you don’t fall our Mam’s best cup when you do do (sic) the dishes.” The dialects of South Wales vary greatly over even very short distances

The Very Rev JOHN ROGERS
Llandaff,Cardiff. Sir: Mrs Johnson (letter, 19 March) was told she must not breast-feed her baby while travelling on a British Rail line since taken over by Virgin West Coast. I challenge Richard Branson to become the first rail magnate to introduce a baby-friendly carriage on his trains. Imagine how much easier it would be to travel if children had somewhere appropriate to play and be fed, changed, etc, on long journeys

STEPHEN GRAY
Berwick upon Tweed.