Prices making 
it the last post

I RECEIVED a bulky Christmas Card from a relative in the States. It cost her $1.05 (just under 65p) to send and was posted on the 17th – a week later than “our” last posting date to the USA. I had her card weighed and if I were to return the same sized card it would cost £1.90, very nearly three times as much. The smallest cards I could send over there were still £1.38.

Next year I regret I will not be sending cards to the USA, or for that matter parcels. I will seriously reconsider sending internal mail too. Have the Royal Mail not heard of the economic law of diminishing returns?

Raising a smile

From: Ken Brooke, Main Street, Leconfield, Beverley.

I ENJOYED reading Chris Bond’s article on Ken Dodd (Yorkshire Post, December 19). My wife and I with two friends went to Mr Dodd’s marathon concert a few years back at Scarborough.

I like the suggestion by the late Eric Sykes that he should be made available on the National Health Service. Could not the BBC and ITV show five minutes of his live show each evening, just after the evening news?

This would be beneficial to the viewer, it would give us something to smile about, to replace dreary news of the EU the weather, the economy etc.

It would also help increase viewing figures for both channels, well for five minutes anyway.

BBC failings

From: Charles Rushton, Pasture Close, Strensall, York.

WE are presented once again with mismanagement or worse, from within the ranks of the BBC. Hardly a day goes by without one saga or another catching the eye. We need reminding that this is a supposedly national corporation, non-political and independent, staffed by super-generously rewarded professionals. Really?

If your journalistic staff did a similar job, the Yorkshire Post would be no more. As it is, every failure seems to be rewarded with another pot of gold to the failures and few or no dismissals. When will we see a return to a BBC, the envy of the world, for its probity and reliability? Never, I’m afraid.