This is a sad day for freedom of expression

This is a sad day for freedom of expression.DR RICHARD ETHERIDGEMARSDEN, WEST YORKSHIRESir: We should not be surprised that Mr Wolfgang was bundled so energetically from the hall at the Labour Party conference for telling the Foreign Secretary he was talking nonsense. Mr Straw's assertion that the only purpose of our invasion of Iraq was to impose democracy there is clearly nonsense, but we are now used to the manipulation of the truth by this government.What is surprising is that Mr Wolfgang was apparently the only person in the hall to spot this. But then he is a refugee from the excesses of the Third Reich and so has a longer memory than most. His treatment in Blackpool exposes the nasty side of the stifling of honest opposition.CHRISTOPHER MARTINLONDON W2Sir: It was surely correct that Mr Wolfgang was ejected from the Labour party conference. That he was 82 years old and had fled Nazi Germany was irrelevant.Here was a man heckling the Foreign Secretary over such an irrelevant sideshow as an illegal and unnecessary war, the consequences of which are daily deaths in Iraq, when this was a day the Labour Party was concentrating on the vital issues of the day such as the banning of crisps and fizzy drinks from our schools.Thank goodness New Labour has its priorities right, After all if Iraq was important they would have had a debate on the issue.IAN PARTRIDGEBRADFORDSir: In a long-ago election I remember watching Harold Wilson being vigorously heckled on television. The presenter asked the Soviet ambassador, sitting next to him, whether the fact that this could take place was the sign of a properly democratic country. The ambassador looked somewhat sheepish and confused.JOHN RATHBONECHELTENHAMSir: My admiration of and sympathy for Mr Wolfgang is tinged with envy.

If I was considered sufficiently dangerous at the age of 82 to have the anti-terrorist laws used to protect members of the government from me, I would die a happy man.JIM CORDELLMANCHESTER Deaths of children in custody Sir: We are working with the families of children who have died in penal custody (letter, 28 September).Families' distress at the deaths is exacerbated by the serious delays in completing the investigation and inquest process - delays of up to two years. "The fact that is now costs nearly £1 a litre to fill up a car and a lot of that is fuel duty means that people in general may be more willing to look at other ways of paying to drive," one adviser said.Privacy could also be a problem since the black boxes will be able to pinpoint where any car is at any time of day or night if it is being driven. Although the feasibility study calculated that charges might be as high as £1.34 for driving on the most congested roads at the busiest times of day, the vast majority of roads would cost a fraction of this, with the toll starting at 2.4p a mile. That would give manufacturers two years to perfect the technology and three years to roll it out, fitting new cars with the necessary black box when they go for their first MoT.But even the enthusiasts admit there are big obstacles to overcome beyond the task of physically installing the equipment The biggest is to win public support. I wouldn't underestimate the work that would have to go into a nationwide system To install 20 or so million cars will not happen overnight. But if the data collection is the same, there is no reason you couldn't use our system to pay your car insurance and your road tax depending on when you drive."Advocates of road pricing believe it could be introduced in as little as five years. The data is fed back to a central computer at Norwich Union's headquarters using the Orange mobile phone network, enabling it to bill the policyholder each month according to usage.Douglas Vallgren, the marketing manager for the Pay As You Go project, says: "The Government is looking across the whole of the industry to see what works and has spoken to us and we are sharing our knowledge.

Using GPS satellites, the black box records when and how far the car is driven and what road it is on. On present trends, traffic levels will increase by 25 per cent by 2010 and a further 10 per cent by 2025.Stephen Joseph, the director of Transport 2000 and a member of the steering group which produced the feasibility study for the DfT, says there is no doubt about the political and commercial momentum building up behind the concept if the interest shown in it at this week's Labour conference in Brighton is any guide. All the intermodal studies show that you can build what infrastructure you like and expand public transport, but you won't solve the problem of congestion until you tackle the issue of demand management."A senior figure involved in advising the Government added: "The official date that has been put into the public domain is 2014 but ministers and officials are beginning to realise there are good reasons why something could happen earlier."The Norwich Union pilot, known as Pay As You Go, was launched a year ago with 5,000 motor insurance policyholders, and the company has since signed up 1,500 young drivers - the area of the market the scheme is aimed at because they are at greatest risk of accidents.Each car is fitted with an IBM-designed black box wired into the battery and ignition system. "Alistair Darling is very serious about this and so are a number of very large companies who have realised there is big money to be made because of the size of the revenues," Mr Joseph said. "The Government has more or less convinced itself there is no alternative out there. The study calculated it would take only a 4 per cent reduction in traffic levels to cut urban congestion by a half, producing savings of up to £12bn a year.

These would replace car tax and fuel duty so that motorists would pay to drive, a bit like households with water meters paying according to their consumption.But the main drive behind the idea is to cut congestion. Plans for a nationwide system of road pricing under which motorists could be charged as much as £1.34p a mile are being accelerated dramatically by the Government. Alistair Darling, the Secretary of State for Transport, wants to introduce a mass pilot scheme in one of the UK's large conburbations - possibly the West Midlands - within the next five years. This could pave the way for the introduction of a scheme covering the whole country on a much faster timetable than ministers had originally planned. A feasibility study published last summer by the Department for Transport described the development of a national system as a "massive and complex task" and said it could not be in place until 2014 at the earliest.Since then ministers have been heartened by a number of developments: first, the generally uncritical reaction to the idea; second, the successful, albeit delayed, introduction in Germany of a nationwide road-tolling scheme covering lorries; and third, the launch of a pilot scheme in the UK by the insurance company Norwich Union which uses the kind of technology needed for a nationwide system and is now being tested in 6,500 cars.Last year's feasibility study estimated that a national road-pricing system, whereby motorists are charged according to the distance they drive, the roads they use and the time of day, would cost £3bn a year to operate but generate £9bn of annual revenues. Or, as others thought, this was a flop-in-waiting - the revenues accumulating in these upstart businesses are a house of cards; the US, which considers the activity illegal, could pull the plug on the industry; or poker is no more than a passing craze.. Either online gambling was the commercial potential of the internet coming of age, combining humankind's age-old penchant for a flutter with the accessibility of the internet. The story of online gambling companies and their coming to the stock market has been filled with as much intrigue, bluff and machismo as a game of no limit hold'em itself.