GORDON BROWN

The media publicity over Gordon's condolence letter goes on and on. The son of Jaqui Janes was killed in Afghanistan and GB wrote her a letter of condolence. She was upset because it contained numerous (25 according to her) spelling mistakes. The story ended up in the "Sun" newspaper. GB then rang to explain that no insult had been intended but this call was recorded and again reported although the BBC played Jaqui's voice but only a written transcript of GB's part of the conversation as he was unaware that a recording was being made. Well I'm no fan of GB but I'm with him on this one. It's well known that he has eye problems (he's blind in one eye) and his handwriting is poor. Documents for his perusal are often printed out in large type. Jaqui says the letter was impersonal — well he wasn't her son's best pal and is writing as prime-minister so that is possibly true to to some extent. But at least he hadn't just signed his name at the bottom at the bottom of a pro-forma letter typed by a mini-skirted secretary. And no normal person would think that he deliberately set out to be insulting or unfeeling. It was a mistake — let it go. And if the transcript of the telephone conversation is correct ("....there was 25 spelling mistakes....") then Jaqui's grammar isn't 100% either.