SIR - Since I last wrote to the Craven Herald, earlier this year, on the subject of the future of the Craven Primary Care Group (PCG), much has changed.

Most importantly, the tragedy of foot and mouth disease has occupied our minds. The aftermath of this disease will be with us for some time to come. In the meantime very important decisions are being taken on our behalf, which will affect our health care for many years to come.

Relatively recently, following a review of various services, in particular mental health, a majority of the medical members of the Craven PCG Board was convinced that a link up with Airedale Primary Care Trust (PCT) was the best way forward.

This view had the support of the majority of the GPs and community nurses in Craven. It also had the support of the Community Health Council (CHC), and the Airedale Hospital consultants.

Harrogate had decided they did not want Craven. On the other hand, Airedale PCT were keen to join with Craven, to form a Health Care area, surrounding, and supporting their hospital services provider, Airedale General Hospital.

Unfortunately, at this stage, after many mixed messages, the North Yorkshire Health Authority, with the backing of the Regional Health Authority, said that a PCT, which crossed the health authority's boundary (ie Craven in North Yorkshire, Airedale in Bradford), was not permissible.

North Yorkshire Health Authority had, much earlier, revealed its intention of keeping Craven within its area of influence, at all costs, by its quite ridiculous attempt to join Craven with Selby.

This attempt having failed, Harrogate has been substituted, and the Harrogate and Rural District PCG has been persuaded to take on Craven.

An alternative option open to Craven is to become, on its own, a "level 3 PCT" rather than a full "level 4 PCT". The Craven PCG Board are understandably unhappy about this option, as they fear that the high administrative costs involved would be at the expense of patient services. However, there appears to have been no exploration of the possibility of minimising these costs by sharing the infrastructure with potential partners such as the Airedale NHS Trust, or Craven District Council.

We are thus left with what I can only describe as a messy compromise arrangement.

Craven will be a minority member of the Craven, Harrogate and Rural District PCT Board, the majority of whose members will not be known to the people and medical professionals of Craven.

Our social services will be obtained via this board.

This same board will contract for our hospital and community nursing services via the Airedale PCT. To make matters worse, Airedale PCT may prove to be too small to stand alone, and may well have to join one of the Bradford PCTs.

Craven would then be even more marginalised, and the quality and range of services we now enjoy at Airedale Hospital threatened - see the letter of Dr Michael Crawford representing the Airedale consultants published in the Craven Herald of July 20.

In the same edition of the Craven Herald, County Councillor Shelagh Marshall, a member of both the Craven PCG Board, and the North Yorkshire Health Authority Board, is quoted as saying that if Craven did not join Harrogate, Social Services in the Craven area could be seriously weakened.

Nobody should doubt the importance of Social Services, but in her role as Chairman of North Yorkshire Social Services, has she chosen to ignore the possibility that this merger may put in jeopardy some of our hospital services at Airedale, which to most of us, are at least as important?

Dr Julian Allen and his colleagues on the Craven PCG board have, I know, done their best for us, in very difficult circumstances.

They are now battle weary, and just want to move on.

The doctors and nurses on the Board have already more than enough work to do, looking after their patients. I do hope, however, they will be able to preserve some of the "Craven Identity" to which, rightly, they have attached so much importance in the past.

We now have the public consultation. North Yorkshire Health Authority gives us only one option, Harrogate, i.e. no choice.

Are we supposed to just rubber stamp their decision? The public consultation document, rather than convince us of the common ground between the Craven and Harrogate PCGs, would seem to emphasise their separate agendas, the arrangements for Craven depending heavily upon the involvement of the Airedale PCT.

Hopefully the public consultation will be a meaningful exercise, and our political masters can be persuaded that as Craven/Airedale is a natural community, with much in common, and served by a hospital built and developed to serve this community, that means can be found, to bring about some realistic form of liaison between these two, in which Craven is fully involved in the decision making process on our medical, nursing, and social services.

Through your columns I would urge your readers to attend the public meetings in Craven (in Skipton on August 2, Settle on August 9, in Ingleton on August 30, or in Glusburn on September 12) and to seek answers to the most crucial question, which is "how is this proposed development going to provide a better health service for the residents of Craven?".

Dr Tom Gibson,

Stirton,

Skipton.

Restore chimes

SIR - In your edition of July 20, under the Giggleswick news section, there is an item concerning the chiming of the clock, inviting comment to be made to the clerk of the parish council.

Unfortunately, his name and address were not included in the article. I am not sure of the legality of publishing another's name and address in my letter so if any (and preferably all) of the 249 people who signed the petition to have the clock chimes restored to the normal 24 hour sequence would care to write to my address, I will be happy to forward them to the parish council.

There is no need to reiterate the arguments for re-instating the chiming, as they have all been well publicised.

A simple request to have the clock back to normal is all that is necessary.

Perhaps when the clock is restored the swallows, which have nested in the church porch from time immemorial, will also return. I have missed their beauty and chatter this summer.

Josephine Robinson,

Manor Cottage,

Church Street, Giggleswick.

Beyond sixth form

SIR - I write in response to the letter in the Craven Herald from Graeme Hitchen regarding school selection process and the take-up of A-level education in Skipton.

I do not wish to detract from Mr Hitchen's comments, but I would like to point out to Craven Herald readers a crucial aspect missed in the letter.

That aspect is that Craven College and the essential part it is increasingly playing in this community's education.

The college is the largest provider of post-16 education in the whole of the Craven area. There are currently 736 further education students at Craven College, with more expected next year, studying from the widest selection of provision in the district. Four out of five of these students are aged 16 to 18.

Alongside the extensive vocational range of course, there are over 500 students (full and part time) who study for AS and A Levels.

The college offers an ever-growing real option to school-based sixth form study and I would urge readers of this paper to look beyond the "school sixth form only" in the forthcoming debate.

Alan Blackwell,

Principal,

Craven College,

High Street, Skipton.

Saving the Folly

SIR - I note with interest your article on the Folly at Settle now owned, only in part, by The North Craven Buildings Preservation Trust. You quote the Trust as saying "The Trust has been campaigning for 20 years to find a modern use for the Folly and make it accessible to both the people of Settle and visitors to the town."

I owned the Folly, in its entirety, for almost the whole of the 1980s and spent considerable sums in completing the restoration undertaken by the previous owner, Philip Dawson.

Whilst also being my home, during this time I opened the building to the public trading as the "Philip S Walden Collection of Antiques" . The whole of the ground floor was open to the public with part of the first floor and the entire building was filled with quality antiques, some for sale and some part of the permanent collection.

The house was fully restored and visited and enjoyed by many thousands of visitors both local and from far away.

I was fortunate in obtaining the services of the head gardener from Parceval Hall who designed a landscaped garden together with a koi pond for the rear of the house, a garden I subsequently installed but now, sadly, left to go to ruin.

Rightly or wrongly I felt that both Settle and the antiques business were changing and sold the Folly to Mr Huntley-Burton, a prominent local businessman.

He, apparently, became disenchanted when he was refused planning permission to install a period Charles II oak staircase in place of a secondary more modern staircase. He subsequently divided and sold the building.

I cannot speak for the section now in private ownership, but can say that for all its grand airs, the Trust for a period of four years neglected the building both inside and out and a major part of any money spent recently was surely spent to make good the years of neglect imposed upon it.

I feel that the person due most credit for saving the Folly has to be Philip Dawson and, to date, the trust has little to blow its trumpet about.

Philip S Walden,

Cantsfield Grange,

Carnforth, Lancs.