Help - all I want

to do is recycle!

SIR - I was disappointed to read a notice in the Fleece pub car park in Cullingworth that the recycling bins which have stood there for a number of months will be removed on January 23, and that people in Cullingworth wishing to recycle their rubbish will have to make a special trip to the Council tip at Cross Roads in Keighley.

I find it hard to comprehend that when we are being encouraged to recycle everything we throw away, we are made to take a special trip to the Council tip to sort out our rubbish.

I am aware that a lot of properties in Cullingworth have been supplied with wheelie bins for recycling rubbish but our Court is not one of them, so I feel penalised because I want to do my bit but feel prevented by bureaucracy.

What about people who do not have the luxury of a car - how do they recycle their rubbish? An explanation would be very welcome.

Lynda Nuttall, Blantyre Court, Cullingworth

l A Bradford Council spokesperson said: "The recycling centre has been on the Fleece Hotel car park for the past four years with the permission of the previous owner. We have been asked by the new owners of the hotel to remove the banks. Blantyre Court is in a paper-recycling area and we will be providing recycling wheelie bins to the nine properties on this complex."

Disturbing act

SIR - Reading about the disinterring of bodies/bones from the burial sites in Great Horton Methodist Church graveyard (T&A, January 4) is rather disturbing.

What is the point of digging up bits of long-gone bodies and reburying them? I fail to see why the bones etc should suffer digging up to be reburied but I can sympathise with the loss of the gravestones because they are something more tangible and as it is noted in the article, they are history.

Being a Methodist, I fail to see the need to build a new residential development in the area that is being disturbed.

Perhaps a pictorial record could be made of the gravestones (on CD perhaps) for those who are interested in the historical/family side of things.

Phil Boase, Elizabeth Street, Wyke

Ignorant clergy

SIR - Removing the gravestones from the Methodist church grounds in Great Horton shows how little today's clergy know of the reasons for the gravestones being there in the first place.

They are not there so that we can determine where relatives and others are buried, although this is a good reason for their existence, but to let God know where to find them on the Day of Judgment.

To deprive the dear departed of this facility so that the graveyard can be turned into a building plot is not something those whose loved ones were to lie there for all time would have wished.

But who are we today, when anything goes if it makes fast money, to consider the wishes of those souls once so devout?

J Keith Hustler, Bramham Road, Bingley

Can anyone help?

SIR - I recently acquired a card table made in Bradford by S Hartley, upholsterer and cabinet maker, of 14 Manor Row, Cheapside.

It has an inlaid walnut top which swivels and opens to form the card table with a green baize centre and walnut surround. It has four ornate pedestals down to curved legs with castors.

I wonder if any of your readers know of S Hartley and if they mass produced or made one-off pieces.

I think my table is late Victorian but I would love to hear from anyone with experience or knowledge of Hartley pieces.

Michael Mahony, Coogue South, Ballyhaunis, Co. Mayo, Ireland

Hands off airport

SIR - It is excellent news that Leeds/Bradford Airport is expanding this year to include at least seven new services, and that there are plans to treble the airport's operations over the next 25 years and increase its passenger numbers from 2.6 to seven million.

This is wonderful news for Bradford and for West Yorkshire and will provide much needed jobs and a massive boost to the region's economy.

What I can't understand, however, is how people living in the area can complain about aircraft noise. As far as I know there has been an airfield on that site since the early 1920s, therefore anyone moving there or buying a house in the last 80 years was fully aware of that and therefore has no reason to complain.

So, please, let's not put any obstacles in the way of a development that will be a massive boost to the area.

But, at the same time, let's continue to try scuppering plans for the ridiculous Lake Ludicrous in Bradford city centre, which is a massive waste of money, money that should be spent on a first class concert/exhibition hall and completing our unfinished ring roads.

Malcolm Wood, Westercroft View, Northowram

Nazis' big mistake

SIR - Consistent europhile John Murray, of Honley (T&A, January 3) rewrites history.

The facts are that at the time of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain the axis of evil consisted of Germany, Italy and Russia (USSR).

Possibly the biggest mistake of the war was Nazi Germany turning on its Russian ally and sending its troops, ill-equipped, into the Russian winter.

Certainly our Merchant and Royal Navy battled the cruel sea and German submarines to keep Russia supplied, as it was in our interests to do so.

It does not seem logical, as Mr Murray claims, that the main reason the EEC was formed was to stop conflict between European nations.

The application to join from our country was rejected for some years - some people in the past have referred to us being slow to join.

Peace in Europe since 1945 has been due to NATO not the European Union.

T Hill, Harbour Crescent, Bradford

Up to individuals

SIR - Re the letter 'Spiritual nonsense' from Gary Lorriman (T&A, January 5). He says it is not in human nature to forgive. That depends on how an individual feels.

Christian doctrines go out of the window in most people's minds when a loved one has been murdered. This is very understandable, especially in past cases like the 1960s Moors Murderers Myra Hindley and Ian Brady, who murdered innocent children.

In my view forgiveness is a state of mind, rather than a spiritual concept.

Although I firmly believe the Christian doctrines can teach forgiveness, in some cases, such as the recent Murder of a black teenager in Liverpool, his family forgave his killers, because of their strong Christian beliefs.

But at the end of the day it's up to the individual whether they find it in their heart to forgive and the seriousness of the case.

Mr Lorriman is correct, human nature is unforgiving. With cases like the Moors Murderers and the Yorkshire Ripper I am inclined to agree with him.

R Halliday, Crag Road, Shipley

Not an easy faith

SIR - To forgive is probably the hardest thing asked of Christians, but compassion and mercy are at the heart of Christian belief, therefore the Archbishop of Canterbury was not wrong in asking the Anglican faithful to exercise just that.

Yes, as Gary Lorriman states (T&A, January 5), it flies in the face of human nature, but that is the point.

Human nature is flawed. Religious belief calls on the faithful to rise above it and inject something of the divine into our lives.

It also calls out to murderers and violent criminals to be contrite and to make reparation. That is where forgiveness lies.

It's difficult, but being practising Christian values has never been easy.

Stuart Baker, Markham Croft, Leeds