Letters to the Editor

SIR - From personal experience of working as a volunteer at the BRI and also of family members receiving wonderful treatment at this hospital, I know how lucky we are to have such a wonderful hospital.

I was therefore extremely angry to read Mr Blair puts all the blame for the present financial difficulties on the hospital management, who, over the past few years, have run the hospital extremely well.

All this week we have been reading in the press and seeing on TV that virtually every hospital trust in the country, whether foundation hospital or otherwise, is having to close wards and operating theatres because they are massively in debt, including such hospitals as Great Ormond Street.

Is Mr Blair blaming them for the position they find themselves in, or has he decided Bradford is to be the scapegoat for the Government's inefficiency in the setting-up of foundation hospitals and the running of the Health Service in general?

We have learned to our cost that Mr Blair is never to blame for anything that goes wrong. However he is the Prime Minister and I am sure I am not the only one who think it is time he remembered the saying "the buck stops here".

Mrs Mary Peacock, Keighley Road, Bradford.

Staff's fears

SIR - Now Mr Jackson has stepped down, will the rest of his staff who helped in making this mess follow or is it one more April fool (we're nearly there)?

And how much cash in hand has he taken with him?

Many members of staff are still worried if jobs are going to be lost - when will their fears be answered?

Jamie Lee, Powell Avenue, Little Horton.

Double standards

SIR - In November Shipley Area Planning Panel passed an application for the site of Greenhill Gate gardens in Micklethwaite.

The plans were almost identical to a scheme that was refused two years ago on a number of grounds, including tree preservation.

None of these were overcome in the new application.

In February the planning department admitted it had missed 35 protected trees from the original hearing and ordered a return to panel.

To the objectors' disbelief the planning department recommended the trees to be felled as they were immature and common. This went against the advice of an independent tree expert.

The panel accepted the Council officers' opinion to allow these trees to be felled, despite being protected, and be re-planted at the applicants' discretion.

How can this be? The answer is obvious, this decision best covers up the negligence of the Council's departments for missing the trees in the first place, and the lack of courage shown by the panel in fearing appeal by a large building company.

Therefore if you or I decide to trim a few branches off a protected tree we need it ratifying in triplicate, but if you require 35 trees felling for the sake of three executive homes that's fine if the Council has mucked up in the first place.

Jamie Bell, Fernbank Drive, Bingley.

Partisan paper?

Sir - As I see it, there is little doubt where the political preferences of the letters editor lie, and that of the T&A generally.

This is borne out by Mike Priestley's weekly rant in his North of Watford column. Mike's intemperate outpourings about the present government and his disgraceful assertions about Tony Blair would not be out of place in any extreme Conservative party leaflet.

Oh, and just in case we might have forgotten during the week of Mr Priestley's hysterical outbursts, we have Liz Balding's regular letter to remind us of the PM's perceived failings.

I suppose we ought to be grateful. It can make us quite nostalgic for the balmy days of David Mellor, Neil Hamilton and his brown envelopes; not forgetting those Conservative stalwarts, Lord Archer and Jonathan Aitken, who went to prison for perjury.

Yes, bring back the good old days!

Robert Hughes, Manor Gardens, Cullingworth

l EDITOR'S NOTE: The T&A is non-partisan and politically impartial. The views of our columnists are their own and do not represent those of the newspaper.

Crazy mindset

SIR - It is not surprising Bradford Council has to spend so much of our council tax on clearing up litter if the mindset of one of your previous correspondents is anything to go by.

He objected to on-the-spot fines for dropping litter because, as he already pays for cleansing out of his council tax, he was entitled to drop litter if he wants to.

I wonder if he applies the same argument to other services that are paid for out of the council tax, for example, the police and the fire service - committing crimes or starting fires if he felt like it.

It is a pity that fines could not be extended to private houses as the gardens in many streets I have walked down are full of rubbish and look most unsightly.

Mrs E M Baxter, Hoyle Court Road, Baildon.

Simply murder

SIR - I see that there are one or two comments in the T&A regarding the savage deaths of innocent animals by less innocent people. It's a good job they are on borrowed time.

Prior to the law being passed regarding torturous killing for fun these offenders were doing what they were brought up to believe was right, but now through a democratic vote they are told it is wrong and has to stop.

If they don't stop they will pay the penalty from the long arm of the law and Mother Nature.

After observing the autumn cubbing and seeing the unrequited cruelty of the killing of innocents and following the trail of devastation, the sooner they are dealt with the better.

On my travels I have brought very young baby foxes home from lairs where their parents have been savagely killed and nurtured them.

Derek Wright, Westbury Street, Laisterdyke.

Police poor value

SIR - I dial 999 for the police and, if I am lucky, I get a visit the day after and they give me a crime number for my insurance and don't bother.

Also, when I dial 999 I am connected to Wakefield whose staff haven't a clue where I am or what I am talking about.

The police get £71.36 from all council tax payers on Band A for being a total waste of space.

If I dial 999 for a fire engine, I get one within eight minutes. The call goes to Birkenshaw who have files on all the area and can direct a fire crew to me at once.

The fire service gets £29.12 from all council tax payers on Band A.

Why so much for a police force which gives us very little and far less for a fire service which gives us everything?

P Windle, Spring Avenue, Long Lee, Keighley.

Tramp mystery

SIR - Looking at a recently-rebuilt stone wall on High Bank Lane, just after the turn-off from Bingley Road, I noticed a commemorative stone bearing this inscription:

TRAMP

DIED

MARCH 9 1915

HE MOTORED NEARLY ALL

OVER THE BRITISH ISLES

Can any of your readers help? Who was the tramp who merited this inscription, and who erected the stone?

Brian E Fearnley, Brantwood Oval, Bradford.

Where's Fred?

SIR - Is it possible to trace through your columns a Bradford comrade, Mr Fred Barnes, who lived in the vicinity of Shipley or Baildon?

Fred was a senior NCO in the Signal Troop of 15/19 KR Hussars serving in Egypt, Jordan and Palestine after service in Germany during the period 1943 to 1948. The last time I got a fleeting sight of him was in 1952 as he was waiting for his bus on his way home after business in the city.

I would like to tell him that I have returned to Scarborough and found some other members of our regiment and we are now members of the Palestine Veterans Association, which is based at Eden Camp near Malton.

Should he be able to contact me at this address and number, there is a free weekend holiday in Scarborough waiting.

Stan Archer, C1 Ayckbourn Chapters, Royal Avenue, Scarborough, YO11 2NB, North Yorkshire (tel: 01723 366120).