YP Letters: How to make Brexit an irrelevance

IT is proposed that immigrants should be obliged to take an “oath of integration”, our leaders having at least realised that many of them aren’t (integrated that is).

I am used to half-baked proposals by said leaders (as are we all). For instance, I remember that many years ago a certain (local) county council ran classes to teach children from the Indian sub-continent their native languages, so that they might “retain their cultures” (GP Taylor The Yorkshire Post, December 7). How times change!

All this is against the background of Brexit, of course, which is seen as having caused divisions within society. It hasn’t; it’s exposed them, and the divisions aren’t simply between “foreigners” and the indigenous population. They’re between young and old, employed and unemployed, the wealthy and those struggling to manage, an out of touch political elite and the rest of us, educated and uneducated, and (perhaps most profoundly) a rich and privileged south and a poor and decaying north.

There are those in the national Press and amongst our elected members who seem to think that all this can be put right if we thwart the will of the people by “changing their minds”, in other words they want a second referendum and a “Remain” victory. They’ll achieve this, they say by “chipping away” (that’s the phrase used) at the “leavers” using delaying tactics, propaganda and general wringing.

They really don’t have to go to all this trouble. All that is required is to give people what they need and want. Give them an honest police force, re-nationalise transport and the utilities, bring care homes into public ownership, stop tax dodging by the wealthy, give people a secure and decent free health service, an efficient and fair education and affordable homes.

And most important of all, give people true sovereignty, power over their own lives. Give them an understandable democracy where every vote counts. Give them these and “Remain” or “Leave” become irrelevant.

From: David Downs, Wakefield.

I WAS calmly reading through the letters (The Yorkshire Post, December 7) setting out the correspondent’s constructive arguments in support of HS2 until I reached John Turley’s arrogant, pompous and totally irrelevant statement “the opponents of HS2 have much in common with the Brexiteers, in so much as they appear to be very vocal, backward looking minority who claim speak for the majority”.

Let me remind him that it is his self acclaimed superior educated minority Remainers who are just as vocal and now doing the shouting. As far HS2 is concerned, as a Brexiteer, I totally agree that capacity is the main criteria for its justification, but as a Yorkshire resident, I believe HS3, the proposed Liverpool to Hull line, would be of more benefit to the commercial success of the so-called Northern Powerhouse and therefore should be given priority over HS2.

Factors out of council control

From: Coun David Walsh, Cabinet Member for Adult Services, Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council.

I REFER to the opinion piece by Father Neil McNicholas (The Yorkshire Post, December 8) regarding issues to do with care for his parents.

I accept and know from my own personal experience the strain and suffering caring for parents and other members of the family suffering from dementia, but I do think Father McNicholas needs to consider factors that are outside the control of any local council. In terms of administration of affairs, he accepts that we made errors and that as a result we apologised and – and did so promptly – to put the whole matter right.

However, in terms of the two per cent precept for boosting adult services provision, there is, under the regulations handed down to us by Government, no ability to exempt people already paying personally for such services. The people to complain to are those Ministers who devised and drafted this piece of legislation.

Why it’s Strictly matter of taste

From: Brian H Sheridan, Redmires Road, Sheffield.

AS one of the two “men” accused by Susan Abbott of making patronising remarks about Strictly Come Dancing (The Yorkshire Post, December 7) I would like to ask your correspondent why she found it necessary to bring gender into the debate.

Though Horace and Doris do their best to perpetuate the myth, the stereotypes of the sports mad husband and the romantic wife are long outdated. If my remarks appeared patronising they fell short of the mark: they were meant to be hostile.

Abbey doesn’t need help

From: G Howard, Markington, Harrogate.

I READ with interest your report ‘Cash boost for top abbey’ (The Yorkshire Post, November 30).

It is surprising that at a time when many churches and community organisations are short of funds for even regular maintenance, that an enterprise as large and apparently well-endowed as Ampleforth qualifies for £3m of Lottery funding.

As your article points out, the Abbey includes various commercial enterprises in addition no doubt to substantial school fee income. Could the Abbey not therefore fund its own visitor growth?