Council needs pricing lessons

FOLLOWING the ticketing fiasco for the Opera in the Park Event at Temple Newsam (Yorkshire Post, July 14) it is to be hoped that Leeds City Council learns some lessons regarding their pricing policies at other attractions.

At Lotherton Hall, where only a modest car parking fee is levied at present for entry to the grounds, their proposals are to charge (for example) £6 per adult, rising to £15 for a family ticket. This will be an interesting trick to pull off anyway, bearing in mind there is a public right of way into the estate, but if these proposals go through unchanged then casual visitors will surely stay away and much money will have been spent upfront for little public benefit.

Wages board’s useful work

From: Daniel Vulliamy, Brigham, Driffield.

IS it sensible for the National Farmers’ Union to support Conservative Party proposals to remove the Agricultural Wages Board which has offered some protection to farm workers’ pay over the last 60 years?

How much public sympathy can farmers expect when the Tories take the logical next step in their obsession with deregulation and end the considerably larger public subsidies to farm-gate prices? Incidentally, AWB covers more than minimum pay. Its policies protect school-age farm workers, provide for sick pay and reward training. Does the NFU regard these as outdated and unimportant?

Bats there first

From: Monika Butler, Millholme Rise, Embsay, Skipton.

Jonathan Mortimer (Yorkshire Post, July 16), in his efforts to reduce the bat numbers in his house, may well say that “clearly [the bats] have more rights to my property than I do” – yes, they do, because his house, a converted barn, will have been their home a jolly sight longer than his.

Bats are not doing brilliantly this year due to the low winter temperatures and the cold, dry early summer winds, so we humans should do all we can to support them rather than evict them from long-established roosts.