July 25: Yorkshire’s strength comes from loyalty to our towns and cities

MY gut reaction to this idea of having a Mayor of Yorkshire is that not only is it the thinking of idiots, but that never in a million years will it happen (Tom Richmond, The Yorkshire Post, July 21). It’s absolutely crazy. This isn’t London. We are not Cornwall. Yorkshire has its single name but don’t let that kid you. People in Yorkshire are extremely attached to their cities and towns and villages. I’m from Hull. We have our own strong identity.

The problem is with people like you. Journalists and unaccountable business people. You are on trains all the time. Ninety-nine per cent of people are rooted in the cities and towns and villages where they live. Leeds and Sheffield and York and Doncaster might as well be in Scotland for all they mean to the people of Hull. And vice versa. It’s got a name. It’s called sanity.

Never will we let you do this. History is on our side. History forms our minds and bodies. I am pro northern. I would like to see a party of the North formed. We are 14.5 million people. That’s a quarter of the population of England but our towns and cities will remain unique, they give us our collective and individual strength. All you people can think about is business. And that means short-term thinking. The answer to our problems is political, not economic. We lack co-ordinated strength. Business doesn’t concentrate the people, it breaks them up into exploitable units.

You don’t strengthen a people or region by denying them their individuality, you destroy them. Yorkshire as an idea stands above the county. But town and city and village comes first because that is how we are made, that is our social psyche. We have no affiliation to other parts of Yorkshire beyond the larger idea, which is ceremonial and geographical. We are townsmen, that’s what the people of Yorkshire are. It’s in our blood.

The Yorkshire Post has gone off its head. It’s never going to happen.

Hull will never join such a ridiculous association. This is our city. Keep your hands off it.

From: Keith Kaye, Bridlington.

THANKS for a great article by Tom Richmond (The Yorkshire Post, July 21). We have indeed failed to get our act together. Trouble is we are still talking and not doing.

From: Hilary Andrews, Leeds.

ON the “park and ride” bus to Scarborough cricket, I saw a wonderful advert for the Northern Powerhouse – all of the traffic on the road following five donkeys!