Letters: March 2

Proud of affordable optical service

As one who lives in jogging bottoms and wheels out my one-and-only suit for funerals, I feel Stephen Bryan is himself being judgemental (Optician, February 23). Also, without a franchisor owning 51 per cent of my equity, I have been providing affordable optical services to working-class people long before Specsavers appeared, and am justly proud.

However, I did feel sympathy for the foot soldiers out in the cold leafletting passers-by, as a good percentage are asylum-seekers and, if literate, would need Specsavers’ avowed clear pricing translated into Turkish, Somali and Urdu.

Owners of shopping malls offer perks like rent holidays to attract new tenants, the telling thing will be to see who is still around in a year or two when full costs have hit.