More readers letters - Thursday 28 May

By [rbyrne]

Divide and rule: ward dispute

ON page 19 of your 14 May edition, in your county council election candidates' list, it states "Mere division, formerly Western and Mere ward."

I would like to inform you this is not so. Maiden Bradley was part of the Western and Mere ward and West Knoyle was not. Now West Knoyle is part of the new Mere division and Maiden Bradley is not.

George Jeans, Salisbury Street, Mere

No one cares for the Hunting Act

SO Helen Weeks is angry that the police have put the Hunting Act in the bin where it belongs.

In her letter she claims that the Hunting Act is a very popular piece of legislation. I would like to meet someone else who takes this view. The fact is that most people don't give a hoot about the Act and don't really care whether a hound has chased a fox or not. If it was so popular then surely there would be a lot more hunt monitors, whereas at the present time most hunts don't ever get monitors following them because of a lack of volunteers.

Can she also explain how the Hunting Act was the will of the people as I can't remember having a vote on this subject.

Where are all the MPs who voted for the Act? Funny, they have all gone quiet on the subject, probably more interested in covering the corrupt claims they have been making.

If David Cameron is elected, it will be by the will of the people, unlike the present Prime Minister, who isn't.

Does Helen Weeks really expect grown policemen to stand in a field with a camera to see if a hound chases a fox or not and would the people of the UK really want them to?

I can remember Helen Weeks' call for a police helicopter to be at every hunt meet. Does she still stand by that statement?

Maybe the anti-hunt fraternity could do a poll and ask the question: Would you like to see your local police spending more time monitoring hunts? I won't hold my breath.

Name and address supplied

Health survey is good sense

CONGRATULATIONS finally on a decent use of the Government's time.

I received a survey this week from the Medical Research Council to help scientists get to the bottom of how diseases can spread. Surely if we all back this up there will be no need for the mass hysteria and expense that we have seen in the light of swine flu, with hundreds of thousands being spent on leaflets telling me how to wash my hands! Go to www.contactsurvey.org to find out more.

David Dunne, via email

President tempts us to doubt faith

REGARDING President Barack Obama's address at the University of Notre Dame, he spoke about the need to find common ground regarding fundamental issues such as abortion and embryonic stem cell research.

President Obama tempted students at the university to believe that they could doubt their religious faith even as they "cling" to it. His call for open hearts, open minds and fair-minded words is, ultimately then, a plea to doubt the objective tenets of one's faith. In such a world, doubt becomes the criterion for truth.

This doubt about God's covenant and the accompanying invitation to human beings to free themselves from their limitations has appeared in various forms throughout history.

Once people begin to doubt God's covenant they are well on the way to building their own worlds. Obama, though he speaks of "The Golden Rule – the call to treat one another as we wish to be treated" – does not practise the same conviction in regards to his own political policies on abortion and embryonic stem cell research. He instead treats the weak, powerless and defenceless as a sub-class of human beings. May God preserve us from doubting our religious faith and from following his pragmatic example and agenda.

Paul Kokoski, Columbia Drive, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Record sum will help hospice

THE organisers of the Compton Dundon Charity Antiques Fair would like to thank everyone who supported it and helped to make it such a good day.

In its third year, the fair has raised a record amount this time, allowing the magnificent sum of £1,875 to be donated to the very worthy local cause of St Margaret's Somerset Hospice.

Special thanks must go to all the volunteers who worked so hard to make the fair such a success.

Angela Castle

Councillors deaf to electors' needs

YEOVIL claims to have the mind of a city – heart of the country – but what of the souls who live there?

There is general unease about the council/ and planning decisions – and not just about parking.

What does this have to do with the planning department, the council, councilors and police?

The electricity mains are currently being replaced and the necessary roadworks, in an already overburdened parking area, have further reduced available parking spaces. I notice the parking attendants are out in force giving out tickets like there is no tomorrow. I was one of the recipients, wishing to unload close to home. Is there no consideration at all for this temporary roadworks situation, nor for the fact that it is stressful enough for residents not being able to find a legal space? But what if this is not just a temporary situation?

If the planning department goes ahead with more buildings, this temporary situation will become a permanent one, if not already.

For more than three years the council and highways have been aware of the parking problem in this area and were to provide a solution – as discussed in the residents' parking meeting three years ago, and even residents put forward suggestions in writing. However, they have done nothing except make the situation worse by allowing more building without off-road parking. Comments and disapproval by residents have been put forward at numerous planning meetings, yet building is still passed.

So much for consideration; this is more like a "we don't care, we don't live there" attitude.

This has caused residents endless stress in trying to find a space. I thought Government policies were designed to create a better standard of living environment.

This has also created a less green area, with people having to use more petrol and diesel, creating more pollution, in having to drive round and round to find a space.

It has also put an increased financial strain on the residents' pockets during this particularly sensitive financial time. It may seem like pennies to some but for some it mounts up.

It also means there has been no improvement for emergency services and home health care visitors.

And don't say the residents' parking scheme would have helped, as all those who attended our meeting know the scheme –which would have cost us money – was quashed as it did not provide a solution to our night-time problem of residential parking. Nothing has changed except the increase in parking needs due to more buildings. Is this contrived extortion? The many unanswered questions – some apparently sensitive – at that meeting, which were promised to be answered by certain people – remain still to be answered three years down the road and despite several reminders.

What does it take to get the council and councillors moving? Where are our answers – or have they conveniently lost the list yet again?

This proves the council, planners and highway department lack true, honest and sincere consideration for the people they are responsible to – the general public who pay their salaries, in taxes, but feel they are being laughed at as the departments do their own thing.

It shows they lack effective communication not only between departments but also to residential areas. I have read so many times in the Western Gazette about failed, poorly conducted or non-existent consultations. Who is in charge of these consultations? Are we paying taxes toward the salary of this person or persons?

It shows they do not follow through on their word – even after prompting. No one gets back to you. Is it too much work to find out the answers or is there too much secret knowledge to pass on? This is not very transparent.

Councillors come to us for support at election time but where is their support the rest of the year? My councillor, a very nice man, called and left a leaflet recently – you've guessed – at election time. It is the first time I have received a visit. However, a meeting with councillors regarding an additional building in our area, which was to be arranged between planning meetings, never materialised. The building was approved and with no off-road parking. I see photos of councillors in attendance at presentations and opening events, but I don't often see very much about how the councillors have assisted in change for the residents.

How many other areas have been, or are planning to be, placed in this situation? How many more parking tickets will be issued before departments realise this indicates a problem which requires a solution that is beneficial to the people who live there and not just to line the pockets of departments. Almost £3,000 has been taken in parking fines from only four streets in our area alone.

Councillors, you are making decisions for areas that do not effect you directly, but areas where other people live day in, day out, for many years. These are residents to whom you as a council and as planners have a responsibility, but from whom you have become isolated. I doubt whether any valuable surveys or truly helpful solutions have been offered to residents before the imposition of what planners and councils want themselves, none of which has been based on forward thinking or research into whether it improves the area or environmental standard of those living there.

I see aesthetically pleasing and environmentally friendly front gardens being changed to driveways – hard surfaces compounding the flooding potential – and recycle bin storage, yet see more litter blowing around the streets with fewer public litter bins. Who made it this way?

Still, this is just another letter to the Western Gazette, read by those who can relate to the frustration but ignored, as always, by the people who could make a difference.

Those people are the council, which could be innovative and be the first to actually work closely with and listen to its residents in a more cost-effective, environmentally friendly and people-friendly manner.

Is this just the view of one or many? Mind of a city, heart of the country, but what of the souls who live there? What do they want?

Well, councilors, are you up to the challenge? Can you be the first to stand out and save the taxpayer money, can you stop building inappropriately, can you improve your communication, can you make taxes go down to your improved methods of working? Can you really listen?

Liz Williams, West Street, Yeovil

Let the electors make a decision

MY namesake Ray English, writing in the letters section on 21 May, must have been reading different newspapers and listening to different news bulletins than the rest of us if he believes our salvation lies in the hands of Liberal Democrats.

Their MPs, including their recent leader, have their noses in the communal parliamentary trough as much as the larger parties.

I believe their Yeovil MP is amongst the top 25 per cent or so of expenses claimants.

It's no use trying to make party political capital out of this appalling situation. It is far better to do as David Cameron is doing in insisting that his MPs come clean and let their electors be the judge at an early general election.

Richard English, Broadmead Lane, Norton-sub-Hamdon

Police are ruining our carnival fun

AS one of the founder members, 24 years ago, setting up the Wessex GP of Carnivals with five towns, including Gillingham and Shaftesbury, it is sad to have issues with Dorset Police over the need to get floats back to their bases in the county during the hours of darkness.

The Wessex GP circulation now has nine towns, including Sturminster Newton, in Dorset; the police policy now threatens the continued existence of this carnival circuit which would have enjoyed its 25th anniversary next year.

Carnivals provide the opportunity for many skills to be developed. They cultivate creativity and provide fun and character to carnival towns. Carnival is a special heritage in this part of the country raising thousands of pounds for charities and bringing tourism to Dorset and Somerset in the autumn, after summer holidays.

There is a highways code of conduct that permits carnival floats travelling at night in most of the country, and certainly in Somerset, where the majority of 100ft illuminated floats are based.

Would it not be better for common sense to prevail and for Dorset Police to rely on the code of practice for self-escorting of abnormal loads (ie carnival floats) to return to their bases in Dorset after going to towns in Somerset and Wiltshire, to take part in carnival circuits they have previously entered without this unwarranted and undemocratic prohibition?

G Stockman, Galhampton,Yeovil

Thank you for your donations

RUPERT and Caroline Loder would like to thank all the friends and family who came to Rupert's 40th birthday on Friday 8 May.

A great evening was had by all, especially for those brave enough to join in with the barn dance. Thank you for your kind donations for St Margaret's Somerset Hospice; £600 was given.

Caroline Loder, Fairview Terrace, Limington, Yeovil

Final chance to send message

YOUR correspondent Stanley Booton has made an excellent case for Britain's divorce from the European Union and the urgency of action from each and every voter to set that procedure in motion on Thursday 4 June.

All three main parties have categorically stated they will not take this country out of the EU.

Some of the small parties with candidates for the European Elections are happy to SOUND eurosceptic, but in reality are actually convinced that "more Europe" is better than "no Europe".

However, the British people in 2009 are no longer ignorant pawns on the political chessboard and most wish to make their disenchantment with the European project overwhelmingly clear. The only credible, non-racist political party who can do that for them is the UK Independence Party.

Even if, come the General Election, voters return to their traditional party, they must surely see UKIP will be the only logical choice on 4 June. It is no exaggeration to say the European elections will almost certainly be the last opportunity to send the message to all politicians that Britain wants to be an independent sovereign nation once again, free and truly democratic.

We should not be seduced by the siren voices assuring us Britain can transform this unaccountable, inefficient, corrupt, interfering body that is the EU by being "at its heart". Our European neighbours do not want our advice. They want our money, gas, oil, fish, armed forces and, above all, our generous welcome for millions of their poorer citizens.

Realising the British voter is no longer falling for the ridiculous concept of one good apple in the barrel being able to miraculously make the rest whole again, the Tories are promising, if elected, the wondrous referendum – but ONLY if the Lisbon Treaty has not already been ratified!

Since the only country likely to present an real obstacle to this final nail in the coffin of democracy is currently Ireland, due to be threatened/bribed into compliance later this year, Tory euroscepticism is revealed as a confidence trick. The simple fact is the Conservative Party took Britain into Europe with a lie. They have ever since worked hard to keep us there and they are pledged to continue to do so. As the most Europhile party, the Liberal Democrats are at least honest where their European credentials are concerned, even declaring the referendum we really need is on our continued membership of the EU.

They dare to speak this truth, secure in the knowledge the various movers and shakers whose vested interests are served by Brussels would never willingly allow us such a dangerous bid for freedom.

Our politicians are well aware that Brussels has an even bigger gravy train than Westminster.

Deprived of any real power to serve their country, our elected representatives can at least take advantage of the many opportunities offered by the EU to serve themselves. In that, they appear to have been remarkably efficient!

The final weapon in the armoury of those who do not wish the British people to reclaim our sovereignty is to try to make us believe that there is no point in voting on 4 June.

If the big three are not going to get your vote, they would much prefer you stayed at home.

They will even tolerate accusations of politicians being "all the same", or assertions that we are much too entangled in the European web to escape from it now.

Let's not fall for these sly tactics. All the party leaders are insisting we must have change. Let's give it them on 4 June!

Anita Llewellyn, Kirkway, Broadstone

Vandal attacked blue-badge car

I AM writing in response to the letters concerning verbal abuse to blue badge holders, as my disabled son holds a blue badge.

The abuse we have suffered is physical, not verbal, and that is to the vehicle, not the person.

For quite a number of years we have suffered the occasional minor damage to our car, which looked suspicious but I could not put my finger on how or where it was happening.

In 2006, we purchased a larger car to give my son more space that was almost new.

Within a few weeks, minor damage was appearing on this car and was happening more frequently, and more extensive each time.

It became obvious this was being done deliberately. This continued until 2008, when the culprit was caught after damaging the car on a disabled bay at the supermarket while we were shopping.

This person, who was of mature years and old enough to know better, admitted causing all of the said damage but could not explain the reason for doing it.

I think that to vandalise anything which is for the use of a disabled person is as low as you can sink.

I hope the person responsible is proud of their handiwork, and if or when they awaken from their twisted and warped dreamworld, or ever finish up in the same position as ourselves, they might then realise the stress and worry involved with caring for a disabled person.

Life is stressful enough without having to deal with idiots like this.

Name and address supplied