Peter Rhodes on one-way banter, red poppies and why he's not shopping at Waitrose

THANKS for your suggestions of logos to go on the new 50p coin marking Brexit. One reader suggests calling the coin the Farage. Another offers the motto FEU. But my favourite so far is the simple and rather poignant "Auf Wiedersehen, pet."

AS the Philip Green "banter" affair rumbles on, a reader points out that a common dictionary definition of banter is "the playful and friendly exchange of teasing remarks". The key word here is "exchange." If there is no answering back then it's not banter. And who dares answer back to the boss?

I WEAR a red poppy in remembrance of those in my family who served or died in the wars. I do not care for the virtue-signalling and sneering that goes with the pacifist white poppy of the Peace Pledge Union. But the poppy issue that irritates me year after year is the Royal British Legion's use of the hallowed poppy symbol on its merchandise ranging from shopping bags to dog bowls. Tacky and tasteless.

SOME time ago I wrote about the Tommies of the First World War who fought and died not in the familiar mudscapes of France and Flanders but in the far-off Middle East. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission has been in touch to point out that, after years of war, CWGC staff returned to Iraq this year to work on damaged or destroyed memorials. In this week of remembrance you can read about their work here.

A VACANCY has arisen for Editor of Waitrose Food magazine. The successful applicant will offend nobody, avoid all contentious issues and have absolutely no sense of humour.

THIS time last week William Sitwell was Waitrose Food editor, a job he had held with some distinction for some years. Then he was emailed by a vegan freelance writer Selene Nelson. She offered him a regular series about plant-based diets. Sitwell replied in an email: "Hi Selene. Thanks for this. How about a series on killing vegans, one by one. Ways to trap them? How to interrogate them properly? Expose their hypocrisy? Force-feed them meat? Make them eat steak and drink red wine?" It was clearly a joke but Nelson was allegedly so horrified that she went public with the email and, as the false-outrage echoed through the spineless management of Waitrose, Sitwell was sacked. Nelson defends her action, claiming this spat is "about why it’s accepted or considered funny to speak to vegans with hostility and anger." Really? Or is it more about a freelance hack having her idea rejected?

SUPPOSING, for example, that William Sitwell had replied to Nelson with exactly the same email but ended it with the words: "Having said all that, Selene, I love your idea and I'd like to commission 10 features at £1,000 each." Would Selene Nelson still have felt the need to broadcast the editor's "unacceptable" words to the world? Do lentils fly?

IN the meantime, I won't be shopping at Waitrose.