Peter Rhodes: The less we pray, the better we get

A reader asks: "Why, if mineral water has been percolating through volcanic rocks for millions of years to achieve its level of purity, does my bottle have a sell-by date of November 15?"

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A good point, which leads fluidly on to the latest TV advert for S. Pellegrino mineral water. Three guests in a smart Shanghai hotel find the restaurant closed in the early hours. So they sneak into the kitchens, steal some food and make an Italian meal for themselves. Dishonest, certainly, but better than punching the producer, eh?

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There is no period more difficult to portray than the near-past. So full marks to ITV for the excellent two-part cop drama, Code of a Killer. It was set in the 1980s and the props, clothes and attitudes were so perfect that you could almost smell that essential pong of an old-fashioned nick, the heady whiff of stale tobacco and Brut.

The computers, filing cabinets and houses were authentically 1980s but the stars of the show for me, (apart from David Threlfall as a tenacious, world-weary old detective) were the Rover SD1 "jam sandwich" police cars. I assumed these 3.5 litre dream machines , the sleek predators of the motorways in endless pursuit of speeders, had all rusted away by now. Suddenly they were back. Anyone else have a flash of guilt?

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A poll reveals that Britain is one of the least religious countries in the world. So does that make us a nation of wicked, immoral and selfish folk? Apparently not. A survey a couple of years ago by the World Giving Index revealed that Britain is the most generous developed nation when it comes to giving to charity and helping strangers in distress.

So we are godless and yet good. In fact, if you want to find an unhappy, uncaring, lawless, ignorant and impoverished country, try looking at the list of the ones where the holy men are in charge. As a general rule, the more religion you get, the nastier life becomes.

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How stupid do they think we are? Cameron promises to exempt houses worth up to £1 million from inheritance tax. Miliband promises £2.5 billion extra for the NHS. Clegg promises light at the end of the tunnel and Farage promises massive cuts in immigration.

The truth, as we have seen during five years of the Coalition, is that election promises crumble the moment you do a deal with another party. That's why Cameron's 2010 promise of a £1 million inheritance-tax threshold and Clegg's promise of no tuition fees never saw the light of day. It is a simple process: 1) Make a promise. 2) Form a coalition. 3) Ditch the promise.

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"We're being utterly and profoundly dishonest." Historian David Starkey on both Labour and Tory promises that "you can have all the goodies of the welfare state if you only screw a little bit more money out of a few multimillionaires, and ordinary people won't be affected by it." Well said, that man.

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One stern promise we can cheerfully disregard is this week's suggestion that foreigners will be asked to produce identification before getting NHS treatment. I doubt if there is an NHS doctor or nurse alive who would refuse to help someone in distress simply because they couldn't produce a passport.

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BT has just "upgraded" my email account, springing adverts on me that I neither want nor need and which are allegedly based on some sort of cyber-monitoring. So far, two finance firms, a stairlift company and Age UK chairs. I may sue.