Tuesday's Letters: We would be richer if we were safer on roads

Children are abused and neglected; lives end before they even begin; relationships and families are destroyed; violence and illness proliferates; victims become long term sick and unemployable. The burden on the NHS and the police is huge.

Ultimately, the health, the well-being and the efficiency of the nation are being seriously compromised (Yorkshire Post, September 15).

The area at the top of many people's concerns from this abuse is the number of lives that are lost on our roads. Experts have identified that 430 lives were lost last year to drink driving and at least another 215 to driving under the influence of drugs. Without action, doesn't the latter promise to get a great deal worse?

A Government commissioned committee, led by Sir Peter North, and backed by AA director Edmund King, along with many health experts, are

to advise MPs that the police need to take a tougher approach to drugs, and that the drink drive limit needs to be lowered (comparable with that in Europe's other leading nations).

Will the Government introduce such measures? Given the resources needed, it seems most unlikely. Could the police cope if the measures were introduced? Given the massive cuts they might have to make, it is highly unlikely.

So it seems the nation will continue to suffer from all the aforementioned problems. Indeed, as the cuts to public services start to bite, doesn't history show that alcohol and drug abuse will only get worse?

According to the Department for Transport, each and every road death costs the nation in the region of 1.5m.

According to the advisory committee, tougher measures to reduce the number of alcohol and drug related driving offences would save at least 100 lives in the first year.

Just for starters, this would be a massive saving to the nation, would it not?

How efficient would our police force be if they were given such an amount?

How much richer would the nation be if it were safer and healthier?

From: Allan Ramsay, Radcliffe Moor Road, Radcliffe, Manchester.

Bus services degenerate into a mess

From: Dave Thorpe, Red Hall Way, Wellington Hill, Leeds.

I READ with great interest the letter from Paul Kirby (Yorkshire Post, September 9) on the subject of recent changes affecting bus services operated by First Bus in the Wetherby area.

As a daily user of the bus services in question travelling to Wetherby, I am in total agreement with Mr Kirby on the issues he raises.

I would like to add my own comments as follows:

The problems of unreliability which Mr Kirby attributed to the operation of these services from the company's Hunslet garage, following their transfer from the former depot at Cherry Row, are not due to the location of that base per se, but rather, at least in part, to the scheduling of these services in conjunction with the X84 (Skipton) route.

There is now an additional problem of congestion and delays in Leeds city centre as a result of crew changes being carried out at a totally unsuitable location on the Headrow, as opposed to Cherry Row as formerly;

The erstwhile route in north Wetherby often presented difficulties for drivers who were unfamiliar with the geography of the area.

If anything, Mr Kirby's comments on driver attitude underplay the phenomenon, which appears endemic in all areas of the country in which First Bus is the operator. The curmudgeonly behaviour of which Mr Kirby writes is particularly noticeable in the Leeds area, especially when one returns from, say, Brighton or Nottingham, two cities with excellent, locally accountable public transport.

In conclusion, I would merely say that the whole matter of bus services in Wetherby (and elsewhere in West Yorkshire) appears to

have degenerated into a lackadaisical mess.

On course for confusion

From: Tony Akkermans, Rowton, Craven Arms, Shropshire.

RECENTLY, I was fined 60 and had my licence endorsed for having been recorded driving at 60mph on the M606 out of Bradford.

One doesn't expect 50 mph speed restrictions on motorways, except for road works and neither I nor my passenger had noticed restriction signs, although they must have been there.

Doubtless many drivers must be trapped this way but my main gripe is with the scheme that points on the licence can be avoided if one submits to a "speed awareness course".

I reluctantly agreed to this but it turns out that the course must be taken in Yorkshire and the travelling distance involved (a round trip of 300 miles) makes this prohibitive for me.

I asked if I could take a course locally in Shropshire but this request has been ignored. This arrangement strikes me as highly discriminatory to out of area motorists.

I have written to the Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke pointing out the unfairness, as well as to the West Yorkshire Police, but to date have not received a reply. I am an OAP who normally attracts queues behind him and the whole thing is rather ironic.

Abuse cannot be condoned

From: Janet Berry, Barfield, Hambleton.

I ALWAYS admired Ann Widdecombe for her straight talking and honesty but I was shocked to hear her views on child abuse by priests.

She said it was not just confined to the priesthood. We all know this but this crime is particularly terrible because priests are put in a position of trust and to take advantage of young children cannot ever

be tolerated.

This Pope was guilty when he was a cardinal of merely moving priests on allowing them to continue instead of making an example of them and removing them from the church. They should have been prosecuted instead of being allowed to continue ruining lots of children's lives who as adults are still suffering today.

I can never understand why they do not allow priests to marry. The practice of not allowing them to marry goes back when parishes were too poor to support a wife for them but this archaic law should be revised so that they can live a normal life.

Unfortunately, Ann Widdecombe seems to be turning out to be quite frivolous and enjoying media interest. What a pity. If she is not careful, she will be a figure of fun rather than a once respected lady

Labour's mistakes

From: Coun John Abbott, Conservative and Unionist Group – Bricknell Ward, Kingston Upon Hull.

JW Smith's list (Yorkshire Post, September 6) of the supposed

achievements of the last Labour government is long, but it ignores several points.

Firstly, all this was paid for by hefty increases in all manner of existing taxes and the invention of new ones – neither he nor I will have heard the term "stealth tax" before 1997.

Secondly, not all is as it seems with what Labour did with our money. Leaving aside the massive deficit (67 per cent of GDP in January), the longest and deepest recession on record, and other evidence of Labour macro-economic mismanagement, is Britain a healthier, safer or more

socially cohesive place now than in 1997?

Rising poverty, rising teenage pregnancies, rising levels of violence, rocketing levels of NHS bureaucracy, target culture in distorting clinical priorities – I could go on, but the picture is clear, and was clear enough in May to lose Gordon Brown his job.

Why can't we shop in peace?

From: M Turnbull, Yeadon, Leeds.

CAN anybody explain to the shoppers of Leeds city centre why they have so many people asking for money on Briggate? On Saturday, September 11, I went in to Leeds with my family. We were absolutely fed up of being asked by charities to give money – they must have been every 10 yards.

There were other people walking round sticking flowers in people's faces and asking for money. The thing that most concerned me was a woman with a pram being stopped by a woman while she nagged her for money for flowers or a balloon. This is a disgrace.

I hope these people will be investigated as we are supposed to be having a clampdown on benefit cheats.

Anyway, I will not be shopping in Leeds city centre again. I'll go to the White Rose shopping centre and shop in peace.

Blot on the landscape

From: Eric Vevers, Turnberry Avenue, Alwoodley, Leeds.

THE letter from AG Parker about the White Horse sightings (Yorkshire Post, 10 September) amused me no end, albeit it wasn't intended to because I could never imagine any merit at all in extolling the fact that this ugly monstrosity can be seen from as far afield as north Lincolnshire.

This mis-shaped blot (it bears more resemblance to a giraffe) has bespoiled the landscape around some of Yorkshire's finest countryside for far too long and if anyone with a half decent bit of artistic skill in them could be bothered, the thing ought to be dug up and made to look a bit more like one of our beloved four-legged friends.

I'm pleased to report that this chalky monstrosity cannot be seen, thank goodness, from any vantage point round north Leeds.

Last rights

From: Mrs J Firn, Templegate Walk, Leeds.

I WRITE after reading the letter from Mrs R Thompson (Yorkshire Post, September 15) regarding funeral donations. Her experience mirrors mine, 16 years ago. My husband died suddenly, reasonably young, and our local church was packed.

We had negotiated donations for a local heart charity, but I was upset, some time later, to learn from the officiating curate that the church had taken a large portion of the generous collection, despite the full payment of church fees.

At such a sad time it seemed churlish to question money matters, but in later years I felt sorry that our charity was deprived of valuable donations.

I believe this practice has ceased now.

Wind energy generators face peril on the sea

From: Dave Haskell, Newchapel Road, Boncath, Pembrokshire.

I AM amazed at the lack of letters from marine and electrical engineers highlighting and warning of the foreseeable plight of the many wind generators the Government is proposing to install off our shores.

Anyone living on, or near the coast, will know the corrosive effect of sea air, not to mention how maintenance engineers are supposed to service these monstrosities through the winter storms, or indeed bad weather during the summer months – perhaps Chris Huhne, the Energy and Climate Change Secretary, does not think machinery will break down

and require the necessary servicing.

It must be in everyone's interest for this Minister to speak to a few wise old lighthouse keepers, for that will surely open his eyes to the dangers of the sea and the foolishness of it all?

To be sure, the Minister needs to acquaint himself with the hymn, For those in peril on the sea, and I offer no apology for saying that he is "completely at sea" when it comes to the large- scale generation of electrical energy and the vital importance of "secure" energy requirements for the UK – indeed, for the real and urgent need for "proper" new power stations.

Hopefully someone will take him aside and whisper in his ear the Latin: mox nox in rem (let's get on with it).