SIR - As a former mill worker, I was interested in the article in last Wednesday's T&A regarding other former mill workers who were seeking compensation for illnesses caused in some cases by poor or non-existent safety conditions.

I worked in a textile mill from the late Fifties to 1970. When I started there were very few Asian workers but their numbers did increase over this period, although they were always in the minority.

Everyone worked in the same conditions, which were certainly not ideal with the noise and the "fluff" flying about in the air (especially in the carding department).

Yet this was accepted without protest from the workers who recognised that they were in full-time paid employment.

While thankfully safety working conditions have improved, many of the jobs have now disappeared. What price progress!

I hope that should any of the mill workers of that period have contracted any ailments relating to their working conditions, they will hasten to contact Mr Aurangzeb Iqbal so he can also act for them.

Brian Pickford, Summersbridge Crescent, Eccleshill.

SIR - In reply to the report in the T&A of April 10 about a Bradford solicitor taking 60 Asians to London in a bid for compensation for working in the mills.

First it has nothing to do with Downing Street. The mills all had owners.

What about all of the people who worked in the mills? I started at the age of 14 and so did thousands of others. What about our youth?

My sister is deaf and full of arthritis from working in the combing department. We all have some sort of ailment, so if these people are entitled to compensation, so are thousands of British workers.

Who do you claim from as a lot of the mill owners may be dead?

L Scully, Exmouth Place, Bradford 3.

SIR - Re the attempt by Pakistani ex-textile workers to obtain compensation for the poor health due to occupational hazards.

Their solicitor, Aurangzeb Iqbal, quotes one Fazal Hussain, 70, who now has poor eyesight, damaged ligaments and chest problems.

Well, Aurangzeb Iqbal, I am the same age and I could provide another 1,000 OAPs with similar disabilities at that age who have no connection with textile manufacture.

Furthermore, Mr Iqbal quotes compensation to miners.

But they were employed in a nationalised industry and short-comings were the responsibility of the Government. All textile mills, most long defunct, were privately owned.

Who will pay? Does Mr Iqbal expect the British taxpayer to fork out, including many former textile employees?

Les Brotherton, Caroline Street, Saltaire.

SIR - What a refreshing column Sarah Jakes, right, produced on Wednesday, April 10 (Voice of Youth column). I do not normally subscribe to beggars because there is work there for the getting, but there is a chicken and egg situation with that. No address - no job: no job - no address.

If only our city fathers were far-seeing enough to open a hostel for people who are in receipt of a job offer, so they might take the job and the beggar count would fall.

As for the man in "the habit". Yes, I've seen him many times and always wave to him and receive one back. He has been absent for a while but I spotted him last week at Odsal.

Phil Boase, Elizabeth Street, Wyke

SIR - Ms Iqbal's letters are always so balanced. Her letter (T&A, April 10) headed "War on Muslims" left me a little confused. I do wish she would get off the fence, does she like America and Europe, or not?

If I understood her correctly, she feels very strongly about the evils of America and Europe.

I wonder why she doesn't go and live in an enlightened Muslim country that would live up to her ideals.

If she can find any Muslim country that would grant her the rights and privileges she enjoys in Britain - equality for women, free education and access to higher education, a national health service, an elected government, freedom to practise any religion, and very importantly free speech - perhaps she would be good enough to share that information with us.

Robert Hughes, Manor Gardens, Cullingworth

SIR - In reply to Ms Mubarik Iqbal's letter (April 10). Every time she writes it is to attack this country and its allies.

I begin to wonder why she lives here when she could live in the civilised countries of Pakistan (where the police beat people with sticks for demonstrating) or Saudi Arabia (whole limbs are cut off for petty crimes).

With regard to the Israeli problem, perhaps she could explain why the Muslims took shelter in a Christian church? If the rules were reversed and Jews had taken refuge in a mosque they probably would have been dragged out and hanged.

G Frayne, Hawthorne Avenue, Shipley.

SIR - I find it very sad and disheartening in light of the recent riots that Ms Mubarik Iqbal (T&A, April 10) still can't seem to find anything positive in her life while choosing to live in England.

Still, if she thinks gas bombs, suicide bombers, sanctions and poverty is the right way forward, then I wish her all the luck in the world.

Darren Park, Brunswick House, Bingley.

SIR - M Wood criticises the "anti-Israeli rhetoric" that is apparently fashionable these days (Letters, March 10).

Let us take a brief look at the facts. Which country in the Middle East (a) refuses to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and bars international inspections, (b) routinely violates international borders of other sovereign states with warplanes, artillery and naval gunfire, (c) has seized the sovereign territory of other nations by military force and continues to occupy it in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions?, and (d) has been in blatant defiance of 69 United Nations Security Council resolutions and has been protected from 29 more by US vetoes? Answer: Israel.

Which country does not approve of having UN forces provide protection for the Palestinian people from Israeli agression? Answer: USA.

Which country is the UK and USA planning to bomb because "UN security resolutions must be obeyed?". Answer Iraq.

Long live democracy.

Ian Bennet, Parkwood Road, Shipley

SIR - At last someone is in the world who could slap the face of Big Brother America.

Saddam Hussein may be dangerous when and if he has mass destruction weapons and would need to be controlled. I am asking the Big Brother to sort the one (Israel) who already has mass destruction weapons and is out of control now.

Everyone is entitled to use whatever means one has to defend oneself. Therefore if the Middle East has the weapon of oil, they must, if they want, use it and rightly so to save every one of them, otherwise the fate of Muslims everywhere in the world would be the same as Palestinians and Iraqis.

America has been punishing Saddam Hussein for disobeying it for more than ten years. We will see if it has guts to do the same to Israel.

Mubarik Iqbal, Oulton Terrace, Bradford 7.

SIR - What type of sport is the Grand National? Most of the horses never finish the course and have a good chance of being put down.

Just because it's an yearly event doesn't mean the race is acceptable.

D Loxam, Parkway, West Bowling.