Letters: The London Mayoral Race has turned into a racial debate

As polls predict, Sadiq Khan could be elected as the forthcoming Mayor of London. It is disheartening that the whole campaign, which was supposed to be a celebration of democracy in our rainbow nation, a grand success of multiculturalism and social integration, has been turned into hurling racial slurs and religious accusations of antisemitism and racism. The election of a Muslim as a mayor will not herald an era of greater tolerance towards Muslims. In addition, any mayor will endure an uphill struggle to solve a multitude of societal ills from knife crimes to gang cultures and domestic violence, deprivation, income inequality and political disenfranchisement. People have lost interest in this dirty politics of smear campaigns and character assassinations.

Dr Munjed Farid Al Qutob

London

In his article today on the copyright problems of Ravel's Bolero, John Lichfield makes an all-to-common error in saying the work “rises to a triumphant crescendo”. More accurately, it “crescendos to a triumphant climax”.

Graham P Davis

Bracknell

Though opinion polls can sometimes be wrong these days, it's almost inconceivable that the SNP won't win today's Holyrood election. But exactly why are we voting them in once more?

Over the last nine years, despite the best efforts of frontline professionals, we've witnessed declining standards in our public services - in education, the NHS and the emergency services.

But why has the SNP let us down so badly? The answer is simple. The effective running of Scotland is always subjugated to Ms Sturgeon's number one fixation: breaking up the UK against our democratically expressed wishes.

So what does Ms Sturgeon admit she intends to concentrate on immediately if she wins today's election? UK break-up.

Backed by a massively effective PR team, the telegenic Ms Sturgeon is an immensely powerful communicator. But is this reason enough to re-elect the SNP? The party that's guilty of nine years of public sector mismanagement, as a consequence of its monomaniacal obsession with separating Scotland from the rest of the UK?

Martin Redfern

Edinburgh

Are you following the Guardian and backing Clinton? This article totally fails to mention the significance of Cruz dropping out on Sanders versus Clinton. It has "yuge” advantages for Sanders. Without Trump dominating the media, the democratic race will get proper coverage; and when people get to hear him, and hear about his policies, including how he will pay for them, they vote for him. Independents who would have voted for Trump will now vote for Bernie and, most significant of all, Clinton’s unpopularity in a dirty fight with Trump is likely to sink even lower; already her chances against him have dropped 2 below, whilst Sanders holds a commanding lead.

Given the remaining states favour Sanders, he may now get large wins, but even if he doesn’t catch Clinton on pledged delegates, there will be strong reasons (as Sanders has been arguing) for super delegates to flip and support him against Trump.

Mora McIntyre,

Hove

Ten articles on football and two on tennis make up the entire sports section of the new Independent this morning. You don't seem to have noticed that the domestic cricket season began a couple of weeks ago. So do I now have to buy two newspapers in order to read the latest cricket news?

Jeremy Lawford

Exeter

It's good to see Amol Rajan's comments back in “print” in today's (Wednesday) edition. (Oh dear, another print cliché!) It would be very helpful if you could somehow include the name of the writer on the contents page so that we could go to our favourite journalists from there. Any chance?

Rosemary Mathew

Cambridge