While the chancellor is at it (Rachel Reeves orders investigations into £600m of Covid contracts, 22 September), she might investigate why thousands of self-employed people prevented from working for the best part of 18 months received nothing and had to survive on savings and the generosity of friends and family. Michael Heaton Warminster, Wiltshire Could someone please explain to me how the “outfit” consisting of what appear to be several hundred yards of Christmas tree streamers and a sunburst headdress, in your picture from Kevin Germanier’s fashion show in the print edition (Rise and shine, 25 September), fits the description of “ready-to-wear”? By whom? Jill Wallis Aston Clinton, Buckinghamshire My father, son of a fruit wholesaler, taught me that to test the ripeness of a pineapple, you pick it up by one of the leaves of its top. It is only ripe if the leaf comes away and the pineapple falls (Ready or not? The expert guide to buying fruit – so it is always ripe and delicious, 25 September). Elisabeth Crowe Great Shelford, Cambridgeshire Would the Earl of Devon be happy having root canal treatment from someone whose only qualification was that his great-grandfather was a good dentist (‘This is our culture’: what Earl of Devon thinks hereditary peers bring to Lords, 23 September) Geraint Hopkins Llanharan, Rhondda Cynon Taf Doesn’t Keir Starmer remember that the “light at the end of the tunnel” (Opinion, 24 September) is the light of the oncoming train? Didn’t he listen to John Peel? Marian Nyman Whitstable, Kent