I was saddened to hear about the passing of Paul Hepworth. Although I’d never met him we sparred many times in these columns. We disagreed on almost everything but he was always very civil in what he wrote and we did agree Michael Portillo would be an excellent Prime Minister.

Now the floods are subsiding we should again take Portillo’s advice on how to tackle future flooding. Portillo, like me, believes we should commission large scale infrastructure projects to get excess water flowing to the sea via new channels. Creating alternative storm drain channels is more effective than adding a few inches to an embankment.

RIP Paul.

Dr Scott Marmion, Woodthorpe, York