10/05/2005

Surely some of those voting for Labour because of Mr Blair might not have done so had someone else been the party's leader.

If a party can just oust its leader, then surely, in a democracy of a government of the people, the electorate ought be permitted to return to the polling booth to approve or disapprove of the party's choice - Bethany-Megan Robinson, Middleton-St-George.

ELECTION COVERAGE

CONGRATULATIONS to The Northern Echo on your election coverage - not too much and not too little.

Whilst your coverage was fair and, as far as I could read, without undue bias, our electoral system is plainly unfair and completely biased.

Labour polled 580,000 votes in the region, the Conservatives 218,000 and the Liberal Democrats 256,000. Nearly half (47 per cent) of the votes cast were not for the Labour Party.

Result?

The region north of the Tees is represented by 28 Labour MPs, one Liberal and one Conservative. No wonder people don't bother to vote. - Peter Wilson, Barnard Castle.

LIBDEMS

THE country has said its piece in the election: it has vindicated the Liberal Democrats as being the real alternative. Voting for the LibDems has been shown not to be a wasted vote.

In the post election speech by Tony Blair, he said: "We have listened to the electorate and will respond wisely and sensibly". This confirms essentially what the majority of the electorate feel about the ruling Labour Party: they were untrustworthy, have not managed the country in the interests of the UK, and were incompetent and downright arrogant.

This is after his second term in office and now we have him for a further term. Let notice be served to the Labour Party that this is their last chance to get it right.

Otherwise they will suffer the same fate as the Conservative Party has over recent years at the next election. - Colin Telfer, Darlington.

NEW LABOUR

HERE comes another four years of mass immigration, higher taxes, anti-Christian views in favour of Muslim propaganda and further steps towards Europe .

Anybody fancy moving to Australia? - Christopher Wardell, Darlington.

VALUABLE ROLE

ASSUMING PG Elliott-West's letter (HAS, Apr 23) is for real and not a few "tongue in cheek" comments, then it shows a breathtaking lack of knowledge and understanding of the value of modern day teaching assistants/classroom assistants.

My daughter is a teaching assistant at a primary school in County Durham and I strongly resent the implication that assistants are incompetent and create difficulties for teachers.

She has been qualified for a number of years (and regularly updates her qualification). Her role is valued by all staff.

If they were not working with small groups of children or implementing Government intervention programmes, targets that children must achieve would most definitely not be met.

Implying that they are incapable people requiring the same attention teachers devote to their pupils, is not supported by my daughter's experience.

The teachers she works for often say they find lessons hard without their support.

She also runs one of their outof-school clubs to promote learning to be fun. This is successful and has been praised by Ofsted in helping to raise attainment targets.

She is trained to implement five intervention programmes for literacy and numeracy, so how one teacher can teach all the curriculum and fit all intervention programmes, displays, speech programmes, work with children with special needs, who can be very demanding, within a class of 30+, without any help, goodness knows. - G Longstaff, Richmond.

TRAFFIC CHAOS

IT appears that a system of traffic chaos is being designed into Darlington's road system.

There won't be any room for cars, taxis and disabled parking when the new one-way bus routes come into being in Priestgate and Crown Street, which, when added to the proposals for traffic thinning, will make many shoppers go elsewhere.

Even now there seems to be many vacancies for stalls in the open market and there are numerous unoccupied shops in the town centre.

So what support will there be for the new Commercial Street shopping complex with difficult traffic access into the proposed new mutli-storey car park at Kendrew Street?

There seems to be one hopeless plan for traffic and another plan for genuine development within the town without any link between them. Overall, is there any one person in the town hall accountable for this mess? - L Hume, Darlington.

DAD'S THE WORD AN award-winning television company wants to hear from women who have broken tradition and left the kids in the care of the dad, when they left home.

Increasing financial independence and a rise in the number of stay-at-home dads, means that more women are choosing to leave their kids in the care of the dad following a marriage breakdown.

Perhaps he was the better parent, or maybe you wanted to make a go of a career. Whatever the reason, we would love to hear from any women about their experiences. - Contact Simone in complete confidence at simone@bettytv. co. uk or call 0207 290 0675.

POPE BENEDICT

MIKE Baldasera (HAS, Apr 28 ) will know that the church used to burn its dissidents at the stake. Is this policy now almost reversed?

Anybody who dares to doubt that paradise consists of more and more cannabis, abortions, wars, speeding, mortgages, condoms, supermarkets and divorces, suffers a "hate campaign".

Such abuse is now being directed even at Benedict XVI.

This spiteful human-centred "religion" - i. e. humanism - is just selfishness with a fancy name.

Though I am not part of Benedict's church, I support the appointment of this homely and scholarly man, who, from his post-1945 German background, avoided neo-nationalism and became an internationallyoutstanding professor of theology.

Sixty years after the end of the war there is a German Pope of obvious "peace and goodwill" who works hard for worldwide reconciliation.

After 2005, every German or Japanese under the age of 60 will have been born after 1945, ie.

without any personal responsibility for the two world wars.

Benedict is a truly international Pope who clearly has never lost the "common touch". I wish him long life, good health and good luck in his mission. - E Turnbull, Gosforth.