Trying desperately not to sound like "disgusted, the Home Counties", the views being perpetrated from some quarters in defence of David Cameron –

along the lines that he was a student at the time of Lord Ashcroft's alleged revelations about his elitist lifestyle and that, more or less, is what students do, so it's fine – cannot go unchallenged ("Sturgeon piles pressure on PM over Ashcroft tax status", The Herald, September 22).

This is not least because of the affront it is to many thousands of undergraduates up and down the country,

like my hard-working granddaughter attending Glasgow University, enjoying her youthful freedoms, intellectually and socially.

In spite of many parties attended and much "frivolous" behaviour, there is never any mention of coffins, dead pigs and the like.

It may, indeed, be the case, as George Bernard Shaw remarked, that "youth is wasted on the young". It's quite another notion entirely to condemn all students in assuming that "the young have wasted their youth".

G McCulloch,

47 Moffat Wynd,

Saltcoats.

Colette Douglas Home claims she “will never be able to look at David Cameron in the same way” after reading about the book by his erstwhile chum Lord Ashcroft ("Cameron and Ashcroft share a lofty sense of entitlement", The Herald, September 22).

I was a member of St Andrews University’s overtly elitist Kate Kennedy Club with its procession in which the most attractive, blonde public-school freshman played Kate.

He was often of such surpassing beauty that dons were known to have fainted in the street. Sadly all that stuff is unacceptable in these bland, politically-correct times.

Surely of greater significance is David Cameron’s "First" and the love, compassion and support he gave his wife during the short life of his son Ivan.

Rev Dr John Cameron,

10 Howard Place,

St Andrews.

The furore over what the elite boys of the Bullingdon Club and the Piers Gaveston Society get up to in their initiation rites brings to mind Dorothy Parker's thoughts on the rich: ''If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to .''

James Mills,

29 Armour Square,

Johnstone.

I very much agree with Dr Peter Rice, chairman of Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems, that the "mocking of [Charles] Kennedy's alcoholism" by the Liberal Democrat Glee Club is not helpful ("LibDems in storm over mocking of Kennedy's alcoholism", The Herald, September 22).

The missuse and abuse of drugs often hits the headlines and gets publicity but I believe the abuse of alcohol is a much greater problem for many families. Dr Rice is right to say that treating alcoholism "as a joke" is not helpful.

Ron Lavalette,

69 Whitlees Court,

Ardrossan.