Journalist Owen Jones

• TO lose one phone to a thief is unfortunate, to lose a second perhaps doubly so, but a third? (Phones snatched from diners as street thieves return, May 7).

One has to wonder whether Owen Jones spares a single brain cell to consider how he may safely use his expensive phone when out and about…

If you have to make a call, ensure you are standing against a wall, or ideally inside a building where a cyclist cannot reach you easily; if you are out running, the sensible thing is not to have earphones in, as you cannot hear anyone approaching.

Leave the phone at home, or if you must have it with you, put it in a zipped pocket. But to leave it on a table outside (or even in) a restaurant is simply madness.

A contributory factor is, of course, the hugely increased number of bikes and (illegal) scooters on the roads now – all because of the steady pressure to abandon our cars.

J BARTON
Bevan Street, N1