Bank will not let me have my money

I WRITE with regard to your article (Yorkshire Post, June 16) about cheques. My worry being the last few lines of the article about withdrawing the guarantee card.

I have a Santander account and they stopped the guarantee card several months ago and it has caused great problems with refusal to accept from all shops and our railway station.

However, I used a high street bank cheque with guarantee card on Friday, June 10, to buy my ticket to Darlington to visit the nearest branch of Santander.

They have blocked my card PIN to prevent me drawing cash, not issuing me with a new cheque book so I cannot transfer my money to another bank and flatly refusing to accept eight items of identification that I produced, advising that they only accept a driving licence or passport as proper identification, neither of which I possess.

I had three Santander monthly statements, all showing that I had more than £7,000 in the account, letters from their Bradford office, and a Hambleton Council pass with my photo on it, but they said all were unacceptable. When I said I wanted to take out £1,000 to put in another bank so that I could draw cash, they refused my request but told me that they charge £10 authorisation fee to do so. Luckily they still pay my direct debits, but it will be a few years before the money runs out.

Safeguards on animal testing

From: Dr David Scott, director of science funding, Cancer Research UK.

CANCER patients and their families are at the heart of everything we do. Our research has saved many lives in the past and will save many more in the future. In certain areas, research involving animals remains essential to understand, prevent and treat cancer.

We do no research with monkeys, dogs or cats (Yorkshire Post, June 21). We have strict ethical policies in relation to animals and follow rigorous Government guidelines to ensure that animals are only used where there’s no alternative. It is a legal requirement that potential new treatments are tested in animals before they can be tested in people. Where our research does involve animals, those studies use animals like mice or small organisms such as fruit flies and microscopic worms.

Millions of people are alive today thanks to life-saving treatments for cancer. Cancer survival has doubled over the last 40 years – that progress is based on the wide array of new treatments developed and tested using animal research. Every family in the country has benefited from this scientific research.

Remember the elderly

From: Mrs E Bell, Sunfield Drive, Stanningley, Pudsey, Leeds.

As another octogenarian who worked here for 40 years, I wish to endorse the letter from Mrs D Highley (Yorkshire Post, June 14) regarding the treatment of the elderly who have paid taxes for half their lives. Non-working immigrants complain of receiving £40 per week for food when they pay no rent or council tax. Most amazingly, they are entitled to all free utilities.

Increasingly expensive gas, electricity and water charges are a huge worry to many former working indigenous pensioners who deprive themselves of the former two, especially in winter, to afford food. Many of them, who have experienced the shortages of wartime, can easily feed themselves on £40 per week, self-cooking with cheaper natural ingredients as they do.

One wonders if there is any cap on the usage of these vital utilities by migrants. With worldwide wars, revolutions and inter-religious strife, half the world must be in need of asylum. Politicians, please put the former indigenous working population first in the matter of financial help.

Kite-flying law makes sense

From: David Butcher, Bence Lane, Darton, Barnsley.

REGARDING the recent piece by Bill Carmichael headed “Clipboard man still flying high” (Yorkshire Post, June 18), if he had taken the time to look on the East Riding of Yorkshire Council website, he would have been able to read the by-law and a brief explanatory note as to why the kite-flying ban was introduced, and how it would operate.

The additional information on the website goes on to explain where various types of kite flying can take place. A little more research would have revealed that bylaws like this are not in the gift of the council, but have to be approved by the Secretary of State. The by-law adopted by ERYC is nationally approved and covers a number of issues, which appear very relevant to safety on promenades.