Ryanair charges: Ryanair obviously makes a lot of money by collecting taxes which are not payable to the airports if the passenger does not fly.

It must be possible to have these monies refunded without plenary charges again collected by Ryanair or other airlines. If all airports collected all charges from the carrier for all passengers booked on all flights then the refunds could be made by the airport authorities, thus taking the likes of Ryanair out of the loop and their hands off our money. Des Carrick

I'm just back from France, but without any of the lovely wine, cheeses, clothes. Between Ryanair's miserly 15kg limit, and the no liquid in your cabin bag, all we could bring back was two cases full of our dirty clothes! All the pleasures of shopping in local markets, bringing back presents to family and friends - all denied. How sad. How dreary. Joan Hannon

Penneys/Primark

Penneys seems to be the perfect embodiment of this disposable culture of ours. It's mad nowadays that we can buy clothes that we know we will have thrown out in a month's time. Personally, I've gone to the recycling centre with "old" clothes at least three times in the last 12 months. Isn't there something wrong with that? Maybe what we need to start doing is buying more longer-lasting clothes, which while they may be more expensive, will probably make us appreciate them more. Everyone has those items of clothing that they truly treasure. Mainly, I think we need to start valuing things more. Gareth Hargadon

Pet insurance

Reminds of my dad's standing policy regarding pet health care. "If the cost of getting it treated is more then having it put down, well, I'm going with the cheaper option." David