Historic pool faces the axe

YORKSHIRE is rich in historic swimming pools. There are good listed examples at Bramley in Leeds, Queensbury in Bradford, Batley and Hull.

But Manningham in Bradford has the most important of its kind in the country: a wonderfully intact, un-modernised “village” pool of 1904.

Nowhere else can you come so close to feeling like an Edwardian swimmer. And local people love swimming there.

English Heritage says the completeness of the interior is exceptional, yet Bradford Council has voted to close the pool.

Times are tough, but closure will save £120,000, only 0.4 per cent of the £30m in cuts the council is seeking, and the pool will be lost forever. Sadly, once pools close, they rarely re-open.

Far better to keep the building going so that schoolchildren can keep their swimming lessons and local people enjoy the benefits of swimming for their physical and mental health.

Cheap labour is not the answer

From: D Harrop, Malton Street, Sheffield.

In his recent column (Yorkshire Post, March 31), Tom Richmond questioned the absence of English workers at his local car wash prepared to do the menial work.

The bulk of the menial work done in this country over the centuries has, of course, been done by English men and women; much of it, probably most, still is.

However, the cheap labour route to resolving our economic and monetary problems is not an acceptable model to follow, economic recession or not.

The only legitimate case to argue is for an economic model which advocates proper terms and conditions of work, and a fair week’s pay for a fair week’s work.

It will take a long and non-stop struggle before these objectives are seen to be applied universally in the world of work.