16/07/04

This will give local people an opportunity to have their say on the creation of regional assemblies and the future structure of local government in their area. The ballots will be all-postal.

The experience of regional government in Wales and Scotland has been positive, particularly in Scotland where the parliament has responded to local demands and has introduced legislation e.g. the provision of free personal care for older people and the abolition of tuition fees, which is envied in other parts of the UK.

Other European countries also work on a devolved basis.

The Liberal Democrats are committed to a federal structure for Britain and will be campaigning for a "Yes" vote.

Regional assemblies will be able to give time to considering local needs and demands in a way that Westminster cannot. - Jacqueline Bell, PPC Liberal Democrats, Richmond.

THE Comment (Echo, Jul 14) sounded very naive to me. Of course Neil Herron, as an intelligent and professional campaigner, appreciates the importance of the location of the regional assembly to the overall debate.

One of the key arguments of his campaign is that any regional assembly will be Tyneside dominated. Other parts of the North-East would, therefore, suffer as a consequence. To have a consensus emerge, including Tyneside, that Durham would be the overwhelmingly popular choice for where a united North-East voice be based, is very bad news indeed for Mr Herron. To lose a key campaigning point, so early on, just does not seem fair to him.

He could only be left with the point, made by the North-East Chamber of Trade, that the assembly needs to take enough important powers away from Whitehall, Westminster and un-elected quangos to be worth the effort. We should know later this month whether John Prescott will give the region these or lose his nerve and keep too much power in London.

Mr Herron seems to prefer domination from London to being more in control of our own destiny. How sad. He cannot have much confidence in us. - Stuart Hill, Darlington.

THE majority of people recognise that the North-East of England is a region with two main centres, the Tyne and the Tees. Everyone who has had to deal with issues across the region will recognise the 'rivalry' between the two areas and the unnecessary competition.

This has been overcome in the case of funding for trade union education, where it has been granted for the region and not area by area. Other services would benefit from a regional approach that recognises that political institutions that served us well in the past cannot meet the current situation efficiently.

We have the opportunity to have a considered approach to the referendum on regional government and then to express our opinions through the ballot box.

It should come as no surprise that the organisations of the European Union should recognise the North-East as a region since we do.

We need to recognise that a key plank in the current and proposed European Constitution is that decisions should be made as near to the people affected as possible, a principle that could have been adopted from our own practice.

The EU does not require us to have regional government. We, in the regions of England, will make that decision. - Bill Morehead, Darlington.

SMACKING

I GUESS I must be a do-gooder, because I don't think smacking children is necessary.

I have two teenagers, neither of whom takes drugs or sets fire to buildings. One was smacked (lightly) on two occasions; the other not at all.

I have spent my life working with children, mostly those regarded as "difficult". Many of them were consistently physically chastised by their parents, and many of them do take drugs, behave anti-socially, and for all I know, set fire to buildings.

I am not saying that smacking children causes these behaviours in children. But I am saying that it is quite possible to bring up children to be considerate members of the community without doing, so smacking them does not necessarily, in all cases, result in well-behaved members of society.

There must be some other factor that determines how our children turn out.

Sticking vaccination needles in our children guarantees that they will not suffer from various nasty diseases, so, reluctantly, we cause them this pain, because we know it works.

Smacking in no way guarantees that they will grow up to be good citizens, so what right have we to inflict that pain upon them? - Name and address supplied.

SKATEBOARDS

I DO feel strongly that Hartlepool Council should really get down to erecting a proper skateboard park for the young of the town.

The park that was allocated to them behind the Millhouse centre is totally inadequate and a gathering place for yobs, who just love destroying what they cannot take part in or own.

There are many abandoned buildings in the town where a covered, secure park could be built.

These young people demonstrate their skills and cause no other problems, unlike the gangs who hang around looking for mischief, and I think a measure of thanks should go to the skateboarders of Hartlepool for showing the way of how to grow up decently. - JR Kelly, Hartlepool.

SMOKING

THE Government is still dithering about whether to ban cigarette smoking in workplaces, bars, restaurants, etc, when it is so obvious that it kills non-smokers with passive smoking.

Even doctors, who have been to Downing Street trying to save non-smokers' lives, had no response.

If there was anything in a workplace which killed just a few people action would be taken, but here thousands of non-smokers die every year in the most painful way and the reason is ignored.

Lawyers are very keen on no-win-no-fee so why do they not take up a case of a non-smoker inflicted with cancer and sue all the smokers in that workplace. After all, they have killed the sufferer.

If there is insufficient recompense then the firm or the owner of the premises should be sued.

Once it has been established that someone will have to pay for the horrible deaths they are causing, and no doubt insurance companies will never cover the obvious crime, smoking will be banned whether the Government takes any action or carries on ignoring the problem. - E Reynolds, Wheatley Hill.