‘You report on the battles within the National Trust (‘A terribly stately firefight’, News Review, last week). My constituency’s market town of Ashby-de-la-Zouch is the furthest town from the sea: we are quintessentially middle England. Thousands of my constituents visit the Trust’s sites and volunteer their time to support it.

They are the sort of people more likely to proudly sign the National Anthem than take down portraits of Her Majesty. For them the National Trust is a celebration of our past, not a vehicle for the cancel culture and the woke agenda. They sadly regard the Trust as an old friend who has lost their way in life and become distant from them.

I hope they can regain trust in our much-loved national institutions soon – but that will require a reversion to its original purpose.’

Andrew Bridgen, MP for North West Leicestershire