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Laurie Taylor's "litany in honour of the RAE" ( THES , May 3) intones: "And to those who now live comfortably in a 5* department."

Come, come Laurie. It's not so far from Poppleton to Bradford, where the university's only 5* department is being scattered to the wind in the interests of balancing the university's books.

John Hiden
Professor of modern European history and
chairman of the Baltic Research Unit
University of Bradford