Firstly, because of her health, she booked a seat. When she boarded, it was occupied and the company refused to do anything.

Secondly, the train was packed and, when this happens, there is never enough room for luggage. This, and the standing passengers, use passages and doorways, making for uncomfortable conditions.

Virgin claim there is nothing that allows them to enforce seating bookings, although I bet they would have managed if that selfish person had been sitting in a first-class compartment.

Airlines don’t stand for any nonsense from passengers who refuse to co-operate, so trains can surely do likewise. They even have quick access to British Transport Police.

Virgin also says it must accept passengers up to the capacity of the train. Who sets this?

Surely it must be the train companies and they could specify no standing on long-haul journeys.

All seats on these services should be pre-booked (even up to minutes before departure). When the seats are full, no more passengers should be accepted.

We are constantly told there are too many cars on our roads and that the environment is in danger because of this.

I also dislike driving long distances and would much prefer to use the train. However, I am off to York from Dundee in a few weeks and, despite a regular direct service, I’ll be going by car.

A few weeks later I’m off to London. Then I’ll go by plane, where I am guaranteed a seat and luggage is safely stowed away. The same would be true if I went by bus.

It’s time the train companies took a leaf out of other forms of transport’s books or were made to by the authorities. — Avoiding The Strain.

[A spokesperson for Angus Council said, “A footway/cycleway is included in the A92 development and will run the entire length of the route.”]

Defence Secretary John Reid must surely now call together his junior ministers and the Council of Scottish Colonels and between them reverse the decision to create this deeply-unpopular regiment and retain the present system.

Would-be recruits listen to the news, follow the issues and are interested in the future of their local regiment. When they see the release of the common cap badge, they realise government ministers and senior army officials have lied and broken their promises. So why should they listen to any other assurances?

Those in charge should understand the depth and power of loyalty the regiments invoke in its soldiers past, present and future. It is no shame to halt the formation of this unwanted, and unnecessary, “super” regiment.

Ignore the foot soldiers and watch a slow, painful death of a once-proud Scottish Division. — Jeff Duncan, Campaign to Save the Scottish Regiments, PO Box 10083, Dundee DD3 9WW.

My late father was brought up in the Scottish tradition and regularly drank too much.

Rather than following suit, I have never consumed alcohol and prefer spending my money going on holiday.

If as Kathryn Baker says children are like sponges, absorbing all they observe, why is it so many are turning to alcohol? I would have thought the opposite would be the case.

Surely their problems lie elsewhere. — George Aimer, Kinghorne Road, Dundee.

He was killed along with his crew returning from a raid on Hamburg on March 14, 1945.

He was the son of Thomas and Elizabeth Hovell, of Dundee, and the husband of Annie Burns Hovell. He is buried at Dundee Eastern Necropolis (grave reference E. G. 374).

I am conducting research into this bomber crew in order to include their story in a book to raise money for a memorial garden on the site of the former airfield from which this squadron flew in the Second World War. — Peter Gulliver, 21 Scarthingwell Crescent, Saxton, Tadcaster, North Yorkshire LS24 9QE (telephone 01937 558514; e-mail Debra@gledhill32 .wanadoo.co.uk).