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Tuesday's Letters: UK needs strategy for its manufacturing base
YOUR front page article "Recession puts focus on divide of North and South" (Yorkshire Post, August 1) reports that our manufacturing heartlands are bearing the brunt of the downturn.
As Sir John Rose, chief executive of Rolls-Royce, pointed out last week, this is because there is simply a lack of a credible strategy for the manufacturing sector – especially the energy intensive sectors, such as glass, steel and chemicals, which are so prominent in the Yorkshire/Humber region.
For too long, government has assumed that our wealth will continue to be earned from rising house prices and the continued success of the banking and financial services sectors. It has simply shrugged its shoulders as manufacturing moved off-shore to the emerging economies.
It is true that all governments talk enthusiastically about technology, innovation and training as being the way forward, but the ensuing manufacture of products inevitably ends up being located elsewhere – and the jobs go with it as well.
So what needs to be done?
In the short term, manufacturing needs action to free up lending and to make credit insurance more readily available. It also needs to see a boost being given to the construction industry through bringing forward infrastructure projects which will have lasting economic benefit. In addition, the Government could bring forward and enhance measures to insulate existing buildings which would result in huge economic and environmental benefit.
However, the bigger issues are of a medium/long term nature with government-inspired costs likely to exacerbate an already critical situation. The tightening of climate change and emissions targets will impact harshly on manufacturing sectors such as glass – particularly as they will also bear the full brunt of the UK's reckless pursuit of renewable targets which almost all commentators now regard as unachievable.
The next few years will also see the introduction of the Chemicals Directive (REACH) which for some sectors will prove to be a considerable additional cost. The tax system, particularly corporation tax, and the continuing tightening of employment law, also contribute to reducing our competitiveness.
This is why we need a strategy. The UK will need a competitive manufacturing base if it is to continue to generate the wealth and the jobs which we are going to need in the future. That won't happen unless government creates the level playing field that we need in order to survive and prosper.
From: David Workman, director general, British Glass Manufacturers' Confederation, Churchill Way, Sheffield.
Fox hunters conserve only to kill
From: William Snowden, Butterbowl Gardens, Farnley Ring Road,
Leeds.
ROGER Dobson's contention that "hunting with hounds is not cruelty but conservation" (Yorkshire Post, July 27) chimes with the old countryman's claim to "honour the fox and then hunt him". This is hardly in the spirit of conservation. Hunters conserve only to kill.
Indeed, the notion that packs of baying hounds and posses of cantering riders chase a little fox to the point of exhaustion, and a savage death, in the name of conservation, is patently absurd.
Is it not cruel to hunt a highly sensitive creature like the deer with packs of baying hounds? Is it not cruel to set two greyhounds to chase, catch and rip apart a hare?
Not cruel? If that is so, then perhaps we should legalise other activities that are not cruel: bear-baiting, bull-baiting, cock fighting, dog fighting, otter hunting, et al. And all, of course, in the name of conservation.
Only if we are cruel, callous and perverse.
From: Eric Beechey, Eastfield Lane, Kellington, Goole.
ROGER Dobson states that hunting with hounds is not cruelty but conservation. If members of the public could see the video evidence collected by the League Against Cruel Sports while this vile activity was legal they would have no doubt that its chief executive officer, Douglas Batchelor, speaks with authority and that his recently printed comments could be easily vindicated.
Hunting has and always will be a cruel and barbaric activity, even if it is referred to as conservation by its perpetrators.
Celebrate rail passion
From: Colin Foster, Scalby Beck Road, Scalby, Scarborough.
WHAT a patronising attitude your Political Editor, Jonathan Reed, shows towards Lord Adonis (Yorkshire Post, July 31). To describe his enthusiasm for trains as boyish and infer it is something one outgrows is to belittle his interest.
To have a Transport Secretary who is actively concerned about the well-being of our railway system is something of a novelty. Most of his predecessors have been more in step with the motoring lobby and simply paid lip service to the needs of public transport, especially our railways.
When your newspaper is campaigning hard for better transport links, it undermines your cause to make light of such enthusiasm. Give the man a cheer and let's hope he can use his passion to good effect.
From: Angela Hatfield, York.
PARKING places and station upgrades would be the last thing I would want (Yorkshire Post, July 31). A guarantee of of a seat when having paid a large sum of money for a ticket would be very welcome.
Last week I caught a filthy, litter-strewn National Express train from Peterborough and had to stand all the way to York. I was not alone. Several people who had chosen not to stand were sitting on the filthy floor. Just not good enough.
A city to savour
From: M Wadsworth, Bedale Drive, Skelmanthorpe, Huddersfield.
FOR the last three years, our son has been studying for a degree at Sheffield Hallam University. I can only say it has been an absolute joy to visit and walk round Sheffield city centre. By all means have the likes of Meadowhall and other shopping centres for the shopaholics.
The wonderful Winter Garden and Railway Station water feature made walking about Sheffield an awe-inspiring pleasure. The Leopold Square, with its fantastic variety of restaurants, is a pleasure to visit. The tram system is so convenient that no matter where you are going, it's
there. You get a feeling of being in London.
Well done and thank you to all who had the foresight to realise and invest in the town centre. Sadly, it seems that towns nearer to home are only interested in rows of supermarkets and DIY stores with their big cheque books. And the icing on the cake. A degree with honours. Thank you Sheffield.
Waiting at the table
From: Eric Vevers, Turnberry Avenue, Alwoodley, Leeds.
I READ Chris Bond's piece about the Little Chef group with some bemusement (Yorkshire Post, July 30), particularly his comment about his having to wait 40 minutes between his "starter" and his "main course" being a mere "minor gripe"!
What a very patient and over-tolerant customer your Mr Bond must be and I'll bet every underperforming restaurant in Yorkshire would welcome his custom if he thinks a 40- minutes wait between courses is a minor gripe.
It wouldn't be a minor gripe for me, nor the people I know with whom I've asked about the matter. I'd have walked out of the place if they
couldn't perform a lot better than that – whatever the quality of the food.
How we can rekindle solvency and democracy
From: Arthur Marson, Mountjoy Road, Huddersfield.
POLITICS, whether national or local, should be for those who have proven managerial experience and are prepared to participate for the well-being of the country and the community.
If you cannot afford to, then do not try! We can all have good ideas, but most of them have been tried and found wanting by those elected, especially in recent years. The time has come to look back to the days when we were prosperous, and adopt the practices that were in place at the time. Charity begins at home.
There are three things that could help return us to a solvent state:
n Our contributions to the EU would go a long way towards solving our financial problems.
n MPs and councillors should not be paid, only able to claim out of pocket expenses. This used to work.
n Minimum/maximum wages and tax levels set to make the system workable.
With regard to electing representatives, there should be a minimum percentage of the electorate required to vote. This should make those standing try to persuade the voters to do so.
This could be tried out at local elections when only a third of the seats are being contested, and a set percentage of the electorate required to vote for a candidate to be elected, otherwise no representative.
This would bring some semblance of democracy into the system. There is little at the moment, when a proportion of 20 or 30 per cent of the electorate can elect someone, hence the success of the BNP.
The same method should apply in a referendum. Look what happened in Scotland and Wales when a handful of voters put the nationalists in control.
Stock cube's cross purposes
From: Terry Duncan, Greame Road, Bridlington, East Yorkshire.
CHEFS are reported to be getting in a stew over the demise of the easy to crumble Oxo cube, being replaced by a more crumblier one in the shape of a cross, when I presumed they made their own stock.
Can not anyone really see through the real reason for the
transformation? It is Oxo cutting costs, not just crosses out of our beloved old cube of scores of years. With the cross cut out of the old cube, it is obviously less than its predecessor. So, presumably, we will be seeing a massive cut in prices as well, Oxo?
Home thoughts
From: Brian Sheridan, Redmires Road, Sheffield.
I WAS dismayed that some of your readers endorsed a letter which contained a strong implication that Bangladeshi immigrants
contribute "virtually zero" to the economy (Yorkshire Post, July 30). For the record, 90 per cent of our so-called Indian restaurants and takeaways are owned or managed by Bangladeshis. One assumes that they are paying some taxes.
Funny how so many readers who have problems with residents who they do not consider to be indigenous have postcodes in agreeable parts of the county. I had no idea that life had become so intolerable for the indigenous population of Leyburn, Holme-on-Spalding-Moor and Wetwang.
Bracing Brid
From: Dorothy Penso, Lastingham Terrace, York.
YOUR archive picture (Yorkshire Post, July 31) of Bridlington on August 9, 1951, brought back many happy memories for me. However, your caption "the weather was much kinder that year" is misleading.
Look at the men in suits or sports coats and flannels, often topped with a raincoat and trilby or flat cap. Many of the women had full length coats, only a few hardy children wore short sleeves or cotton dresses and cardigans.
I remember that year at Brid very well; nothing changes, some would have said that it was "top coat weather".
Killing fields
From: Ken Holmes, Cliffe Common, Selby, York.
SOME years ago when the Ministry of Agriculture became Defra, I suggested it was meant to mean: Destroy English Farmers Ruthlessly Amen.
Nothing has changed to alter my observation, the true fact being that things have got worse.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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