I have just come back from the St Giles Fair. After the first rainy day it was warm and sunny and there were quite a number of people about enjoying themselves, but they were not spending their money, except at the food stalls.

The rides were being given away to the children by the fair people to encourage others to go on them.

“Trouble is,” said the fair people, “not that people haven’t got money in their pockets, especially around here, but the Government keeps telling them they haven’t got money, so they just come and look and don’t spend.”

Deborah Manley, Plantation Road, Oxford