Join the fight to save localism

STUART Andrew speaks for so many of us who have been lost in the jargon-ridden, target-driven wasteland (Yorkshire Post, October 30).

Honesty and open democratic debates have been put to one side. Numbers seemed to have been plucked from the air by Bradford Council whose history on the proposed building works on the Tong Valley has highlighted their very poor understanding of its impacts.

This valley has seen lots of building encroachment in recent memory and as the green space shrinks the animals and birds leave and the people lose a great recreation area. Some local people talk of leaving, too.

Now is the time for all the people in the heart of, or on the fringe of, the development to realise the threat of building has not gone away and they can still make a difference. Now is the time to join the Tong and Fulneck Association and fight.

I spy a flawed argument

From: Brian Sheridan, Redmires Road, Sheffield

BERNARD Ingham poses the question: “Where have Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, and François Hollande, president of France, been all their lives? (Yorkshire Post, October 30).

OK, Monsieur Hollande acquired lame-duck status shortly after being elected but ingenuousness does not readily spring to mind in connection with Mrs Merkel.

Your columnist harks back to the Iron Curtain and, surprise surprise, quotes Margaret Thatcher: “What is the point of a secret service if it isn’t secret?”

The Cold War is over now, Bernard, and the USA has no greater ally than Germany.

Bernard Ingham rightly cites “today’s real security conundrum. Islamists are waging war on the West”. However, this only weakens his position as the USA’s advocate. It is a pity the Bush administration didn’t show the same diligence before 9/11 when the CIA and the FBI petulantly refused to help each other and security on internal US flights was non-existent: as the terrorists well knew.