Strikes will bring misery to the helpless

I HARDLY dare put into print the contempt I feel for some of our garrulous, bone-headed union leaders who are trying to get their members to strike later this summer.

I never thought I would see the day when selfishness and greed would become trademarks of the British people.

I cannot believe that the over-manned public sector workers who made hay during the Blair/Brown years, who have pension schemes which some in the private sector would die for, would allow themselves to be led like lambs to slaughter by union leaders whose only aim is to cause discomfort for a Tory Government.

Do these people know what misery they are going to cause to the less fortunate in our midst whose services they require to maintain their standard of living? They should be ashamed. It is the private sector, of course, which creates the wealth for these gold-plated pensions to be paid in the first place.

There have been several times in our history when Britain has had its back to the wall but we have always pulled through because we have all acted as one with only one goal in mind.

We have our backs to the wall today financially, but it is affecting everyone in the country, and it is going to be up to everyone to do their little bit to get us out of the mess. People using industrial muscle to get back at the administration is not the way to do it.

It is about time there was more democracy in strike ballots. The fact that 70 people in every hundred must withdraw their labour because the other 30 voted that way is ludicrous. There should be at least a 51 per cent majority for a strike call and I don’t think that is plenty.

From: Christopher Clapham, Shipley.

BLAME the trade unions – how I agree with MP Laycock (Yorkshire Post, June 13). It really is time we stopped blaming Margaret Thatcher for the decline in manufacturing and held the trade unions to account and just reminded ourselves of how they acted in the 1960s and ’70s.

Those were the days when strikes were rife and bashing the management was the order of the day. You do not have to earn a wage rise – just simply demand one. It was the age of the militant who had made British industry the laughing stock of the world.

I well remember a friend asking me: “What’s the difference between a night shift at British Steel and British Leyland?”. The answer was that at British Steel you got a sleeping bag! No wonder they lost just £1m a day. British Coal also reached £1m a day in losses – and so it went on.

British trade unions have always rejected any responsibility to ensure we have a healthy industrial base to create the wealth on which our standard of living and welfare state depend.

The result of their antics is simple: it is now hard to find anything Made in England.

Volunteers and housing

From: Kendal Wilson, Wharfebank Terrace, Tadcaster, Leeds.

I HAVE recently read another masterpiece from the Labour leader Ed Miliband stating that those who work and those who undertake voluntary work can jump the social housing list (Yorkshire Post, June 14).

Take a closer look and you will find that nothing said here is morally correct. An example would be say, a branch of call centre workers who lose their jobs. Fifty per cent find new employment, 20 per cent commit to voluntary work and the remainder can find nothing no matter how hard they try! So where is your moral validity for all this, Mr Miliband?

I believe he and his ilk have no right to try and tinker with those who have, at best, a limited choice. It is social engineering. There are many humans with mortgages or rented property who will take umbrage at these proposals. If Mr Miliband was pragmatic he would set up a national register of skills and volunteers for public works projects who, in the fragile time of unemployment, could work on without the stigmatisation that the media feeds on.

There is one core fact never mentioned and that is if the Labour-led authorities in the 1990s hadn’t instigated housing points schemes and tick boxes and not debunked councillors who sat on housing allocation panels, then the scene of who gets what and where would not be so difficult, and this despite the right to buy movement. There are many empty public properties that could be put to good use, Mr Miliband – with your volunteers.

Worthwhile donation

From: John Noton, Kent Road, Harrogate.

THE donation of £814m to help curb and possibly eradicate disease in the poorest countries of the world is a fantastic gesture by the British Government. It is embarrassing that some Yorkshire people such as your correspondents Carole-Ann Withers and Peter Rushforth begrudge this (Yorkshire Post, June 17).

The amount of money involved may appear “monumental” to Ms Withers but in national terms it’s a drop in the ocean. What would it buy at today’s values? A few streets of property in the posher parts of London? Two or three Premier League football clubs?

Yet the impact of this sum as part of the funding of a well-organised medical programme should be massive. The real scandal is that the other major countries involved appear to have pledged so little.

From: RT Hewitt, Leeds Road, Kippax, West Yorkshire.

MR Cameron has given £650m of taxpayers’ money to Pakistan, £100m to India and now £814m to a vaccination programme that is dear to his heart.

At the same time Bill Gates made a donation from his own personal fortune to the programme. Wouldn’t it make us all proud if Mr Cameron gave a personal donation out of his own back pocket, of say £10m to this worthwhile programme? Surely he could take a personal loan from the IMF on the surety of his memoirs which will be out in four years’ time.

I only hope there will be enough libraries open to make his memoirs a best-seller.