YP Letters: High time to power ahead with charging

WE have a holiday home on the river Esk in Ruswarp which we have had for about seven years, and we have recently 
purchased a Mitsubishi plug-in hybrid car.

However there are no charging points within 15 miles of Whitby, the nearest one being at Aldi in Scarborough.

Bridget Fox: Time to get us on the road to a low carbon future

Newly-built supermarkets seem to put charging points in their car parks.

So hopefully when the Aldi is up and running in Whitby 
there will be charging points provided.

Our car also runs on fuel, but any all-electric car would have problems around the area, and therefore restricted from visiting the area subject to the mileage range of the vehicle.

I wonder if there are any 
plans to install further points around Whitby, as electric cars are the way forward (Bridget 
Fox, The Yorkshire Post, August 17).

At the moment it’s a “chicken and egg” situation that people are put off purchasing such a car due to the lack of charging points in certain areas.

Our main home is in Leeds and we have had a charging point installed in our porch, and there are additional ones, which incidentally are free to use, installed in newly refurbished, or built, Aldi and Lidl supermarkets around the area.

We spend nine months of the year coming to Whitby and look forward to being able to charge our hybrid locally.

Come on Whitby – come into the 21st century!

Green energy dooms coal

From: Coun Andrew Cooper, Green Party Energy Spokesperson, Kirklees Council.

IN “Britain ‘on track’ for coal-free summers” (The Yorkshire Post, August 16), you quote a Drax spokesperson in the headline statement.

That’s surely a cautious interpretation of the plummeting of coal-fired electricity generation, below one per cent over the summer.

The spokesperson is also far too negative about developments in the Southern hemisphere. Analyst Coalswarm note that in the first half of 2018, retired capacity has nearly matched newly-operating plants. Less than 2GW of new coal capacity has been proposed in China and India in total in 2018, Japan has called off 3.6GW of proposed coal capacity since 2017 and South Korea will not permit new coal.

The claim that enhanced nuclear capacity is “likely to be required” is risible – we know how ludicrously expensive and troubled Hinkley C has been, let alone the other new nuclear proposals for the UK, as Germany plan to phase out all nuclear power by 2022.

Researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology have demonstrated that there is no practical obstacle to a 100 per cent renewable future.

Existing renewable, low-carbon technologies (which definitely do not include burning quantites of wood greater than Britain’s entire annual production, as is being done at Drax), combined with energy efficiency measures such as insulation of our poor-quality housing stock, can provide us with a secure future at the lowest practical cost.

Honouring the Amistice

From: Jim Kirk, Middleton.

I COULD not agree more with John Barstow’s comments about closing shops for the Armistice centenary (The Yorkshire Post, August 17).

As a member of Usdaw Executive Council, an organisation of 433,000 shop, factory and warehouse workers (presumably Labour supporters), Mr Barstow stresses that working people and their families take the opportunity to partake in the remembrance events in their communities.

MPs and peers would win huge public support by putting Brexit arguments aside and come together to show their respects on Armistice day.

Will Jeremy Corbyn, who has previously openly questioned what there is to commemorate about the First World War), be present and show the same respect on Armistice Day that he has shown for others?

He was noticeably absent when Armed Forces Day was being celebrated, not forgetting the 100th Anniversary of the RAF. So I can only hope that Mr Barstow has invited the leader of a party created to fight for the wage earners to stand with those wage earners and pay proper respect.

Sir Jim right to avoid tax

From: Harry Brooke, Meanwood.

SIR Jim Ratcliffe’s decision to relocate to Monaco has been criticised on the basis he should pay his taxes in this country.

No mention is made of inheritance tax. Sir Jim is 65 and may well be thinking that to pay 40 per cent of nearly all his assets to HMRC upon his demise is unfair. It’s high time the Government got rid of this confiscatory tax, as they have done in Australia.

Many people’s homes are worth enough these days to be liable for inheritance tax, so their children can’t benefit as many would wish. When tax is paid once on assets and income, that should be the end of it.

I say good luck to Sir Jim and don’t blame him one bit.

Let’s hear a friendly voice

From: Andrew Shepherd, Leeds.

WHAT has happened to the friendly voice at the other end of the phone if you have a problem?

My partner, who is a carer for the elderly, wanted to ring Leeds City Council over a missed bin collection for one of her clients.

There is nobody now to get in touch with – and this has to be done on the computer. What happens to all the people who do not have a computer?

Come on Leeds City Council, get someone to speak.