That Prime Minister of ours is a right little flatterer, isn't he? Especially when he wants something.

And what he wants now is for older people to become leading members of an "Experience Corps" of volunteers, giving up more of their time to help others.

Tony Blair says that older people have accumulated experience and wisdom.

Yes, Prime Minister, we know that. It's that accumulated experience and wisdom that tells people in the Who's Counting? age group that the Government is ripping them off by raiding their pension funds and taking away their married couple's tax allowance, and is insulting State pensioners with an increase of 75p a week.

I'm increasingly getting the impression that the Government regards the older generation as a resource to be harvested by a whole range of means. It's taking some of their money from them and now it want to hijack their time too.

The point is that lots of retired people are already involved in voluntary work. They keep many a community organisation on the road.

Without them, a lot of charities would fold. There already is a vast army of senior citizens working hard and tirelessly for the benefit of others.

However, I'm not knocking the "Experience Corps" idea. By putting volunteering on an official footing and giving it a higher profile, the Prime Minister is bound to put the idea into the minds of people who have never even thought of offering a few hours of their time for the good of the community.

When the State and the Council are unable or unwilling to do things for us, we have to do things for each other. In the small Thames Valley town in which my aunt lives, the retired people under the direction of a dynamic local woman in her seventies have got themselves wonderfully well organised.

Apart from keep-fit sessions and social gatherings, they have a list of volunteer drivers prepared to take people to and from doctors' and hospital appointments or visit the sick and infirm, while other people act as shoppers for the housebound or shopping companions for those who lack the confidence to go on their own.

And they fund their efforts with regular, splendidly-organised sales in the local community centre.

If every village or district had an organisation like that, there would be no need for older people to feel isolated and abandoned, as so many now do.

So if the "Experience Corps" campaign encourages the creation of more initiatives of that sort and throws up energetic volunteers of the calibre of the woman who powers things along in my aunt's Thames Valley town, so much the better.

But I have one question for Mr Blair. If retired grandparents are to spend all day and every day minding their grandchildren, which is a function the Government also wants older people to fulfil, isn't it a bit much to ask them to spend their evenings and weekends working as volunteers as well?

I Don't Believe It!

I promised last week that I'd be returning to the subject of wheelie bins. Oh no I'm not! I can't find the letters - something I blame on Mrs Mildew's obsession with keeping Mildew Mansions spotlessly clean and tidy. She'll have binned them, and I'm not going rummaging out there among the refuse to try to find them.

Anyway, I'm bored with the subject. There's nothing new to be said. People in houses with easily negotiable drives love them. Those who live in terraced streets with tiny yards and narrow back alleys hate them. And that's the end of that.

So here are a couple of grumbles about other things. Mrs D Stringer says Bradford Council will make any excuses before admitting that they're at fault.

She's particularly upset about the way the Rawson Market affair has been handled. Aren't we all! It's been one of the great blunders of the age.

She says that it's lowered the Council in people's estimation, and thinks we need councillors and officials who show a bit more understanding.

And from Paul Stephenson comes more about fog lights.

After consulting the Highway Code he says: "It is definitely illegal, under Regulation 27 of the rear Vehicle Lighting Regulations 1989, for them to be used so as to be lit at any time other than in conditions of seriously-reduced visibility - generally when visibility is 100 metres or less."

So now we know. But will it make any difference to the inconsiderate show-offs who use them in all conditions?

If you have a gripe about anything, drop a line to me, Hector Mildew, c/o Newsroom, T&A, Hall Ings, Bradford BD1 1JR, email me or leave any messages for me with Mike Priestley on (44) 0 1274 729511.

Yours Expectantly,

Hector Mildew

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.