‘We can’t run UK on sympathy’ says reader: should compassionate grounds be enough to extend a visa?

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Have your say on these MetroTalk topics and more in the comments

'Basic fairness is common sense' says reader

Regarding Mohammad Shethwala, who has been ordered to leave the UK just months after his wife and daughter died in June’s Air India disaster (Metro, Mon).

I do not believe this case should be decided primarily on emotion.

Mr Shethwala has spent the vast majority of his life in India.

He arrived here in 2022 as a dependent on his wife’s student visa and found work as a delivery driver while she studied.

He applied to extend his visa on humanitarian and compassionate grounds as he has ‘nothing left’ other than his support network of friends in London.

But for me, India is where his strongest roots and longest-standing ties are likely to be.

As someone who works in the NHS, I see how stretched public services already are.

The UK is under pressure across healthcare, housing and wider support systems.

In that context, it is reasonable to ask whether it is fair for the taxpayer to take on a likely long-term responsibility for someone who has contributed here for only a short period.

I also think the wider economic context matters – and India is a faster-growing economy than the UK.

That is why I find it difficult to understand why responsibility should automatically fall to the British public.

A strong social system works when people contribute into it and draw from it when needed.

That balance is what makes it fair and sustainable.

Once that balance is lost, the system becomes harder to sustain.

To me, that is basic fairness and common sense.

Overall, I believe this case should be approached through fairness, consistency, and realism, rather than sympathy alone.

Mary Smith, via email

Are parents to blame for their children’s bad behaviour?

Your teacher-columnist Nadeine Asbali (Metro.co.uk, Mon) says parents are not to blame for their children’s bad behaviour.

She was responding to the government’s school behaviour tsar, Tom Bennett,
who says that parents rarely say ‘no’ to their children.

Ms Asbali says the issue is that parents are unsupported by government in dealing with today’s social pressures, such as the cost of living and addictive social media.

As a parent myself, I believe parents must be partially to blame.

I have often seen children trying to get the attention of a parent who is on their phone.

I’ve seen a child given a tablet to keep them quiet so the parent can be on the phone.

I have seen parents give in to stubborn children instead of staying firm with their decisions and children allowed to be rude to their parent with no comeback.

All this, to me, can lead to bad behaviour in school at an early age and, although some of the other reasons Ms Asbali states may also be to blame, her total dismissal that parents are partially to blame is biased because she is writing as a blinkered parent.

Corl, London

Got a question about UK politics?

Send in yours and Metro's Senior Politics Reporter Craig Munro will answer it in an upcoming edition of our weekly politics newsletter.

Email alrightgov@metro.co.uk or submit your question here.

Does ‘at least two’ not mean two or more?

You published a headline, ‘Two pupils a day knifed to death’ (Metro, Tue).

Upon reading the first sentence of the article it clearly says, ‘At least two school-age children die each month from knife injuries’.

While still horrific, this is significantly different.

I hope that it can be amended, otherwise I’ll have to listen to my grandfather misquote stabbing figures at me once again to convince me raising a child in London is as dangerous as running a tanker through the Strait of Hormuz.

Ross, via email

Starmer’s vetting knowledge could be a ‘disaster’

If Sir Keir Starmer knew about the vetting problems around Peter Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador to the US, it is a disaster (Metro, Tue).

Then again, if Sir Keir did not know about the issues, it is an even bigger disaster.

I do not expect the prime minister to micro-manage by checking the No.10 petty cash or who is to be the next honorary consul for Kiribati but the ambassadorship for the US?

Are we really accepting this hapless shambles? Robert Boston, Kent

Are there improvements in health tech?

My sister is in her 60s and in remission from cancer.

She found a lump, so tried making a GP appointment but was directed to their website.

She then received an AI form, which asked questions previously answered.

She had to include a photo of the lump but was told not to send photos of a child’s chest or genitals or backside as it may offend the person opening the photo.

When she first had cancer, it took three visits and eight weeks to get tests.

Are these the technological improvements health secretary
Wes Streeting has been crowing about?

J Hall, Beckenham

‘President Trump is a narcissistic megalomaniac, pathological liar and demonstrably unfit for office’

Psychiatrist Dr David Zigmond (MetroTalk, Mon) opines that Donald Trump’s outrageous rantings and ravings are not attributable to cognitive decline but are moral ‘deficits’.

This just goes to prove that psychiatry is not an exact science, as evidenced by the opposite opinion being expressed by many other eminent psychiatrists, who believe Trump is insane and should be removed from office under the 25th Amendment of the US Constitution.

President Trump is a narcissistic megalomaniac, pathological liar and demonstrably unfit for office.

The world simply cannot afford to wait for Trump’s inevitable impeachment following November’s mid-term elections.

This madman occupies the White House and, we shouldn’t forget, has his finger on the nuclear button.

He needs to be removed from office by constitutional means.

Before he blows up the world. Peter Henrick, via email