SO madam Heather Causnett is at it again (Letters, June 29). Is she bothered about rubbish? Or is she just bragging about her holidays abroad?

She certainly talks a lot of rubbish. How dare she say most mothers have untidy, disorganised homes and then calls them feckless, careless and slatternly.

Does she know what the words mean? Don’t other countries have untidy homes? Another thing she should understand – a lot of families can’t afford holidays.

I’m a grandmother and I’m sure like others, it’s nice to know children can enjoy themselves wherever they are.

Mrs A Myers, Hull Road, York.

• HEATHER Causnett (Letters, June 29) prompts the following observations.

Unfortunately there’s nothing new about the dreadful, cavalier approach to keeping our cities clean.

I first found out that Britain was far from being a world leader in cleanliness in 1961, on my first visit to Holland.

I had joined my first ship, SS Maskeliya, in Tilbury.

We had then proceeded up the west coast, calling in at Avonmouth, Liverpool, Glasgow and then, via the Pentland Firth, to Dundee, discharging cargo in each port.

The docksides and warehouses were in very poor condition with shattered packing cases leaking all kinds of merchandise, with no attempts at tidying up.

The whole scenario, in every port, was depressing.

Then we crossed the North Sea to Rotterdam.

The dockside was immaculate, with no trace of spilt cargo, broken packing cases or any of the other detritus littering the British docksides we had, so recently, left behind.

Once we had finished work for the day I went ashore with some of my fellow engineers and I couldn’t help but marvel at the immaculate state of the streets in Rotterdam.

After Rotterdam we went to Hamburg, Bremen and Antwerp, and all were in the same immaculate condition.

Philip Roe, Roman Avenue South, Stamford Bridge.