WE are continually told that Leeds is a thriving, modern city - a model success story for the north.

So it is must be unacceptable for the dental health of our young people, as flagged up this week, to be falling behind places like Hartlepool, Newcastle or Birmingham.

Yet the figures highlighted by the Commission for Patient and Public Involvement in Health show the average dental standards of five-year-olds here to be significantly worse than those cities.

The problem is even more galling in Aireborough, Wharfedale and Horsforth, which used to have one of the best dental standards in Leeds - but is now falling towards the (below national) average.

And the reason? Health experts seem certain it's down to the lack of fluoride in our water supply - something many parts of North West Leeds used to benefit from when its water came from a different, naturally fluoride rich, source.

Now that the health scares over the mineral seem to have all been examined and discredited, it seems to only offer benefits. Isn't it time we as parents, and a community, demanded we add it to our water?

Never too old to stand

up and be counted

AGE is no barrier, the say. In the case of the residents of Wharfedale Court at Pool-in-Wharfedale, they have lived up to that adage by refusing to accept that their residential building would be scheduled for closure.

Leeds North West Homes had decided that the bulding was 'surplus to requirements' because it needed much work and was under-occupied. But Derik Lumby and his fellow residents refused to accept this and have managed to persuade LNWH to do a U-turn and consider other options, including a whole redevelopment into flats and apartments.

Well done to the residents and their supporters for standing up to be counted.