Monday's Letters:We should protest over councils' profligacy

In January 2008, a disabled pensioner led a deputation to inform the council of the extortionate pay it was awarding its officers.

When she announced that the number of council employees paid between 50,000 and 200,000 had risen from 165 to 561 in four years there were gasps, oohs and aahs from councillors who had no idea what was going on. It took a member of the public to do what they should be doing as guardians of the public purse. And then what? Absolutely nothing.

The council continued as before.

Every taxpayer should be up in arms at what councils are doing with consultants and overpaid executives wasting money on hare-brained schemes that don't work. And what do councils do with its incompetents?

It gives them early retirement with six figure pay offs. These bureaucratic parasites should be pushed out of the door with nothing and made financially responsible for their mistakes.

Council taxpayers should remember this when they struggle to pay council tax bills and cast their votes at elections.

They should demand that leaders of errant councils are thrown out of office before they do any more damage

Council democracy needs a complete rethink on how it operates. The public should be able to get rid of councillors and bureaucrats at any time, not only when elections are scheduled.

From: Malcolm Naylor, Grange View, Otley.

From: Barrie Frost, Watson's Lane, Reighton, Filey.

THE editorial comment (Yorkshire Post, April 1 ) on the truly extortionate pay of many council officers, was made on a very appropriate date, as, I believe, too many of them are making fools of the British people.

But, similar criticism of these mind-boggling pay levels has been made on many, many occasions over the last few years without it having even the slightest influence on curbing such unwarranted largesse and it appears no-one can ever ascertain just why, just who, has the power, or the stupidity, to agree such remuneration, and thus the hopeless situation continues unabated.

The council officers receiving such colossal rewards, courtesy of ordinary hard-working people, have, apparently, not the slightest regret or conscience at accepting such sums. Can people, therefore, be criticised for believing a "you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" scenario exists in the corridors of local government which cannot ever be broken by those outside such a secure inner circle?

Desperate Brown is at rock bottom

From: Janet Berry, Hambleton, Selby.

HOW pathetic that Gordon Brown recruited Tony Blair to help him with his campaign. He has used his wife Sarah, Peter Mandelson – whom he did not see eye to eye with – and now his bitter rival Mr Blair. Oh dear, he really is running scared and desperate and so he should be.

He has sold our gold, taken our pensions, reduced this country almost to bankruptcy and I for one have absolutely no confidence in him. Because he wants to borrow at rock bottom prices, we are all suffering.

Interest rates on savings and ISAs are abysmal, one cannot even save for children or grandchildren, who, after all, are this country's future because the rates are laughable.

The sad thing is people are not saving and are spending which is, of course, what he wants. The only thing he seems to be able to do is apologise for everything. We need a strong leader. You may not care for David Cameron but at least he is a good speaker and has some presence.

From: Terry Duncan, Greame Road, Bridlington, East Yorkshire.

SURELY it is time that Gordon Brown must come clean, and the country be told how many dirty deals have been done under the Labour administration.

Already, in very recent times, the PM has had to apologise for cutting the financial backing to our troops at war, giving misleading immigration figures and now he is accused of "lying" over his promise not to tax the Haiti disaster relief music album.

What else is he not telling us – like the unemployment numbers are only going down because more people are "working" for just 12 hours as part-timers, so come off the dole but get the same money as on the dole through tax credits?

Risks over drug use

From: JG Riseley, Harcourt Drive, Harrogate.

PROFESSOR Les Iverson (of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs – ACMD) over-eggs the case for banning mephedrone with the argument that legality may be taken to mean the drug is safe.

Young people need to be capable of making risk assessments and decisions regarding a great range of activities that are legal. The assumption that legal equals safe would clearly be a dangerous one. Yet the professor's reference, and suggested response, to that general assumption can only tend to reinforce it.

This philosophy would have the state claim more and more authority over the individual, spurred on by fear of blame if it is ever found slow to do so.

There is concern to "send the right message" through drug classification, ignoring the traditional advice that those wanting to send a message should use Western Union.

The vocabulary of the ACMD has been limited to a multiple choice maximum punishment for users variously of zero, two, five or seven years imprisonment.

But they could try speaking to us in words. Which part of "not safe" do they think the public are incapable of understanding?

From: John Eoin Douglas, Spey Terrace, Edinburgh.

AS a keen gardener, I am most annoyed that the Government intends to ban the plant food mephedrone because a handful of people are claimed to have suffered ill health or death after misusing it as a drug of intoxication (Yorkshire Post, March 30).

Will I become a criminal if I stock up on it before the ban? Or will my azaleas have to suffer because of a Nanny State attitude towards the lack of self-control of a few selfish drug-taking individuals who will stop at nothing to alter their state of consciousness?

Who will lift this tax burden on pensioners?

From: D Birch, Smithy Lane, Leeds.

IN some ways, I have been one of the lucky ones. This year I will be 87 (born in 1922). I survived the last war, having been called up in 1942, until 1946 – serving three years in war zones in the infantry. I was then demobbed, with a suit and a wife and no home to go to – just two rooms rented to live in.

I finally got myself a job I was happy with in 1951 until my retirement in 1987. I paid all my taxes, plus national health/pension plus company pension for the full 36 years in the job. I also paid 20 years into a company private medicine scheme when it was offered. In those 36 years, apart from seeing my GP when it was necessary, I didn't and haven't cost the National Health

a penny.

Don't think it was easy and I was overpaid, I wasn't. We had periods when money was tight and two recessions to cope with. The mortgage became a drain and my wife told me that she had to hide at times when the coalman came as she didn't have any money to pay him.

Despite all that, I worked hard, 60/80 hours a week and by the time I retired I was earning a good living and paying an average 3,000-plus tax per year. My company pension was paid and with the old age pension I still found myself paying an average of 3,000 per year in tax. In fact, since 1987 as a pensioner I have paid the taxman more than 69,000 in income tax.

Over the last two years, I have sent details to the three main parties who will be fighting this next election, asking them if I would still have to pay that sort of tax money if I went into a care home, so that my immediate family could share their inheritance of my home intact. Not one has bothered to write back and give me any sort of useful answer.

On television and in the newspapers, they are still arguing just how they will proceed and ensure that there will be care for the elderly and how it will be paid for. I know that there are lots of people like me and over 80, who have never been a drain on the country and have paid for many of the things and people who think they have the right to all that the Social Services provide and the benefit system has to offer, who have never paid a penny into it or done nothing for it.

Just for once, for the few remaining years, when some would like to go into a decent care home and who wouldn't mind paying more than a fair share of the cost, stop charging us tax as well. Someone should be able to do the maths and solve the problem of what is a very high cost item, if we have to pay it in full.