Your newspaper does not have to descend into the gutter - your correspondents do it for you!

How can anyone take seriously Susan Thomas's letter accusing the leadership of Cheney School in Oxford of condoning "bullying and assault on a regular basis"?

This is a very serious allegation, likely to have far-reaching repercussions, yet the only evidence she supplies is that of her friend whose office "overlooks the playground".

When I pointed this out to my son, who has been there for two years, he laughed.

He remarked that not only had he never witnessed bullying or assault (apart from two playground fights in his first term), but how on earth could the woman have seen what was happening unless she had binoculars, a febrile imagination and limitless time to gaze out of the window?

What a fairy tale!

Not that I in any way endorse the current school crackdown on school uniform at Cheney.

It is likely to be unpopular with many students and parents.

It is also a high-risk strategy as popular Cherwell School is only a stone's throw away and has no uniform at all!

JONATHAN SAUNDERS Ramsay Road Headington Oxford