Tuesday's Letters: The schools that shirk in the snow

While every single factory, retail outlet and hospital was open for business, most schools were, once again, closed because of the bad weather. The primary school nearest me caters for mainly locally-based children with not much travel involved and this was closed.

The excuse of teachers having to travel does not hold water as all the above mentioned places of employment managed to operate and their staff managed to turn in for work. Perhaps, if teaching staff were only paid on turning in for work, then they might make more of an effort.

It seems industry is full of workers and the education system full of shirkers.

From: M Thompson, Goodison Boulevard, Cantley, Doncaster.

From: David Horncastle, Birkdale Close, Bessacarr, Doncaster.

I WAS interested to be reminded of the keen winters of 1947 and 1963 in your article (Yorkshire Post, January 7) as I experienced both. I would make the additional point that in both years the vast majority of houses did not have central heating, double glazing or insulation. Most people in our area had open coal fires.

In 1947, coal was in short supply and I recall my father visiting a local pit tip with his bike to try bring home a few extra pieces of coal. To rub salt into the wound, the local pit was served by a mineral line which passed right by the house. As children, we would try to salvage a few lumps of coal which fell off the shunting wagons as the train pulled away from a nearby water tower. I think we missed only one day of schooling because no coal had been delivered. We snowballed in the playground, but woe betide any child who dared bring snow into the building – it meant instant punishment with a stroke of the cane across the palm of each hand. Very painful in freezing cold weather.

In 1963, my wife and I were both working and came home to a stone-cold house. The first task was get a coal fire burning in the kitchen to get some hot water. We could only light a couple of fires downstairs and the upper rooms of the house were bitterly cold. We slept with blankets and eiderdowns piled high on the bed. My recollection is that the temperature never rose above zero for several weeks. In both winters, people made every effort to clear the path in front of their own premises. I believe it was considered incumbent on you to do so. If your neighbour was too infirm to do this, then you did it for them. It may be bad now, but it certainly was far worse then.

From: Terry Duncan, Greame Road, Bridlington.

WHY is it that once the wealthy south of England gets into a problem through less than a foot of snow, the Army is called out?

But, when several feet of snow is leaving communities and hundreds of families stranded throughout the north of England and Scotland, there is not a soldier to be seen. We now know whence the Labour Party is seeking votes.

From: Margaret Ward, Hallamshire Close, Sheffield.

DURING the last week, the milkman and the paper boy have delivered as usual – before breakfast. Even the window cleaner carried his equipment from the main road through several inches of snow.

Not so Royal Mail: our post arrived on Monday at its usual time midway through the afternoon. The next delivery was on Saturday morning. My husband rang the local sorting office only to be told the delay was for "health and safety reasons". Are the roads and pavements in Sheffield more dangerous for postmen than for everyone else, I wonder?

From: Rosemary Nattriss, Church Fenton, Tadcaster.

THREE cheers for posties Dave and Lee who deliver to Church Fenton. They haven't missed a delivery or been any later than usual during the bad weather and not a squeak about health and safety. They are heroes.

To get the region's economy going, cut taxes and consign Yorkshire Forward to the dustbin

From: Peter Rigby, Beamsley, Skipton.

THE chief executive of Yorkshire Forward writes like a man pleading for someone to save his skin before it is closed down (Yorkshire Post, January 2).

Cutting through all the twaddle about what a great job they have been doing, and how Yorkshire could hardly survive without them, I was struck by the feeling that Tom Riordan is starting to believe his own "spin".

I have many business friends who tell me that YF has expanded out of all proportion to any economic gain in this region.

Formerly known as the Department of Trade and Industry (Yorkshire) and with a small office in Leeds, I arrived on their doorstep in 1991 to receive, on behalf of our hard-working employees, the Queen's Award for Export Achievement.

I was told by their senior manager that they were a small group of people whose primary purpose was to seek inward investment into Yorkshire, and mostly from overseas companies.

What seems to have happened over recent years is that inward investment has dried up and this Government's "outreach department" had to quickly re-invent itself not only to save their own jobs, but to inflate their own importance. What we now see is a much larger organisation sitting in several offices around Yorkshire and meddling in every corner of our economy.

To get Yorkshire's economy going, we need to cut taxes and consign the Yorkshire Forwards of this world to the dustbin of history. The game's up, and I suspect they know it.

Quango's cost

From: Bob Watson, Springfield Road, Baildon, Shipley.

TOM Riordan's article (Yorkshire Post, January 2) was a predictable selling exercise for his Government quango, Yorkshire Forward.

He did, however, make little mention of its massive budget (provided by the taxpayer), and its large number of staff (well over 400), many of whom are on substantial salaries and with civil service-style pension arrangements. Just how many are strictly necessary is debatable. It was interesting to note his comment that Yorkshire Forward (and others) is "still perceived as being unaccountable". How very true. Yorkshire Forward, like so many other quangos, takes too little heed of the opinions of the man in the street who effectively pays their wages. Just ask the people of Bradford. Far too often they work to their own agenda despite any opposing views. Consultations are not always properly and fairly undertaken, and have been biased in favour of their preferred way forward, as we have seen in Bradford.

I, for one, would not wish to see such quangos continue unless there was a much stricter regime of control and accountability at all levels.

Red tape toll

From: David W Wright, Uppleby, Easingwold, North Yorkshire.

TOM Riordan's contribution to the debate about David Cameron's bid for re-election is timely (Yorkshire Post, January 2), if only to emphasise the need to cut back severely on the countless quangos, bloated civil and local government departments and agencies and to rid the country of bureaucracy and interference.

Tom Riordan states in his defence of Yorkshire Forward that the body should be more accountable, suggesting that "political and business leaders" should be the leaders.

Here he has made a big mistake. For surely it is the involvement of politicians that is to be avoided at all costs and the decisions about the region's future should be made by business people who should consult all other interested parties as and when appropriate?

Family life

From: Alec Denton, Oxford Avenue, Guiseley, Leeds.

JAYNE Dowle's otherwise sensible article (Yorkshire Post, January 7) was spoilt for me by her attack on David Cameron's well-meaning desire to support marriage and her suggestion that this would force parents into an unhappy marriage purely for the money.

She is clearly too young to remember that the fashion for couples to live together without marrying, itself became acceptable for purely financial reasons. This was during Mrs Thatcher's premiership, when both partners in a co-habiting relationship could claim tax relief on the same mortgage, but only one partner from a married couple. Gordon Brown then continued the attack on marriage by withdrawing the Married Couple's Tax Allowance while at the same time refusing to make the Personal Tax Allowance transferable between partners in a legal relationship, whether traditional marriage or a modern variant. This failure to act fairly left many people, particularly women, with a completely useless Personal Tax Allowance and hit the less well-off.

The encouragement of stable relationships when children are involved is important for society and should be one of the aims of any new government. How to do this fairly and affordably is not an easy question to answer, but that does not mean it is right to criticise the intention.

Carbon tax

From: Nigel Bywater, Airedale Terrace, Morley, Leeds.

I RESPOND to the article by Gary Haq about David Cameron's green revolution (Yorkshire Post, January 4). It was a very well-written article but it lacked substance. It lacked the basics, we need to tax carbon.

The French have just recently postponed a carbon tax bill – the tax rate was 15 per tonne of carbon. But the French government was not brave enough and gave too many exemptions. This brought about its downfall, because it was deemed unfair and it is now awaiting a legal ruling.

We need a carbon tax, but we also need to have a Personal Carbon Allowance whereby individuals would have an energy allowance taxed at a lower rate and then individuals who exceed their allocation would be taxed by their energy supplier at a higher rate. A personal carbon allowance would encourage fuel economy, would benefit the low energy user and the lower paid.

The negotiations in Copenhagen were a total failure, but the only way to get other nations to agree is to negotiate from a position of strength. If our Government sets a carbon tax, and gives everyone a personal allowance, income tax can be reduced if more tax is raised from fuel. All the three main political parties claim to be "green", but which party will be honest about taxation? Perhaps we should not vote for any of the main parties.

Past errors

From: Richard Bedford, Ellis Court, Scalby Road, Scarborough,

A NEW year and a General Election pending – the electorate has a serious dilemma regarding who to vote for. Many will reflect on whether it is even worth bothering. Those of us with long memories recall that it was under the Tories that the seeds of many of today's problems were sown – the lunacy of making us dependent on energy resources from abroad and the cult of privatisation.

State education was used as a political football, corporate management principles being used in a way totally inappropriate to the nature of the work involved. This became the era of the freelance "consultant," of people making a financial killing by tapping on a keyboard. No foundations were laid for building a better Britain for all.

So-called New Labour, to their undying dishonour, did nothing to

reverse any of this. Perhaps this will be the time of the smaller parties, but people will need the courage to break with tradition.

There will certainly be interesting times ahead.

True Tories

From: Duncan Anderson, Mill Lane, East Halton, Immingham.

IN 1992, the Tories planned to move to the centre of British politics and to copy Neil Kinnock's Labour. The idea was to confuse the British voting public so that they couldn't see any difference between the two main political parties.

David Cameron's cynical manipulation of the British voting public firstly shows you that the Conservative Party still isn't confident about winning the next General Election and, like the Lib Dems, they will say anything to get your vote.

The Tories won't be able to keep David Cameron's promise of creating a fairer Britain by slashing taxes for the rich and slashing support and services for; the old, the poor and the vulnerable.

Facts of war

From: Michael Ross, Weeton Lane, Dunkeswick, North Yorkshire.

IT would appear that Malcolm Naylor (Yorkshire Post, January 3) has a fixation about Israel. He is now blaming them for the UK's participation in the war in Iraq and in effect the loss of British lives. I cannot recall Israel asking for protection from any outside country or indeed using any outside forces to fight her wars, of which there have been seven since the tiny Jewish State was formed in 1948, and all of which were defensive actions against pre-emptive strikes. To arrive at his conclusion calls for Machiavellian thinking of the highest order.

From: Peter Clarkson, Roman Avenue, Leeds.

MALCOLM Naylor (Yorkshire Post, January 4) has got it wrong. The coalition governments had to act quickly to secure the oil fields. Saddam Hussein had destroyed the Kuwait oilfields by fire. The same in Iraq would have torched a half of the world's supplies. Your correspondent would have been enduring the big freeze by candlelight.