Sir, - Your correspondent Lynn Johnson (D&S Feb 27) complains that having moved from a town environment to the rural tranquility of Skipton on Swale, her peaceful existence is constantly shattered by the noise of aeroplanes flying from Leeming and Topcliffe.

As the operation of aircraft from these sites has been taking place for a considerable number of years, presumably this state of affairs prevailed when she first contemplated the purchase of her property. Thus if the noise and activity was all-pervading as she describes she would have immediately become aware of the fact at that time.

Armed with this knowledge, she must then have made a conscious decision to move into the place nonetheless.

This being the case I would imagine her only hope of gaining respite from her sufferings would be to make representation to the Ministry of Defence to close both of the offending facilities on the grounds that the noise they were generating was getting on her nerves, or failing that to ask them to re-equip Her Majesty's airforce with hot air balloons and gliders, which of course would operate at a greatly reduced level of sound and thereby alleviate her distress.

H BOND

Church Lane,

Eston,

Middlesbrough.

A true Cockney

Sir, - Cor blimey! My attention was drawn to the headline in last week's D&S: "Cockney pride wins the day in Richmond" (Spectator's Notes, Feb 27) and out of undisguised pedantry, I feel that I must make a comment.

I am sure that you will know that the title "cockney" is applied loosely to anyone born in the east end of London, but that the more accepted definition restricts it to anyone born within the sound of Bow bells.

An even stricter definition is for anyone born within the sound of the bells of Saint Mary le Bow on Cheapside but, today, this would make the appellation far too narrow as hardly anyone now lives in the Cheapside area - it is nearly all offices. (It might also be claimed that, in the days before motor cars, the sound of these bells would have travelled much further, and so a larger number of Londoners could claim the distinction)

To come to my point, as the second definition is the accepted one, I am sure that, since I was born in Bow, I can claim to be the only true cockney to have been Town Mayor of Richmond three times - 1980, 1990 and 1997.

I, nevertheless, am pleased at Coun Russell Lord's election and wish him a splendid year in office.

ROY CROSS

Fieldings Yard,

Richmond.

Mencap gratitude

Sir, - We do not want another year to slip by without expressing the sincere thanks of the Northallerton and Dales Mencap Society to all the people within Hambleton and Richmondshire who have made our recent Christmas card and gift sales from our Mencap Christmas catalogue so successful.

Our sales this year are in excess of £21,000. The society retains 28pc of this figure and the Royal Society received an additional five per cent. The fact that our profits are used locally makes our efforts so worthwhile.

All our sales are completed entirely by volunteers.

In 2002 we were able to give £7,000 to the Chopsticks charity as a result of our Christmas sales.

It is essential for us to maintain our sales at this level if we are to continue to give support to our present commitments and find increased facilities for the care of those for whom we work.

SUE LEAR and ELIZABETH BRADLEY

Ellerclose Road

Leyburn

Leap in time

Sir, - I read Nicholas Rhea's piece in Countryman's Diary (D&S, Feb 27) about leap years with interest as our son was born just into March 1. Whenever February 29 comes round I always think "what if".

Nicholas isn't quite correct in stating that further adjustments are made in years that can be divided by 400, to allow for the fact that a year is less than 365.25 days long. Otherwise the year 2000 would not have been a leap year as expected, and this would have hit the headlines as all those people who have a birthday every four years would have had to wait eight years for their next birthday.

There is a leap year in every year that is divisible by four, except for those that are both divisible by 100 and not divisible by 400. So leap years did not occur in 1700, 1800, 1900 but did in 2000.

PAUL ROOME

Culverden Down,

Tunbridge Wells,

Kent.

In the gym

Sir, - I note (D&S Feb 20) that our brave firefighters say they have to go to Brompton-on-Swale to do their daily keep-fit sessions. It doesn't seem long ago that the chief fire officer's predecessor was asking for funding to provide all fire stations with multi-gyms.

Perhaps Eric Clark, the chief fire officer, may like to comment on why his people are not using them. I and no doubt other taxpayers on a fixed income would certainly like to know, especially after he tried to secure a 30pc increase this year.

The question is also raised who is providing emergency cover to Richmond while our Gallant Galahads from Gallowgate are away.

B A BOARD

Reeth Road,

Richmond.

Cut that tax

Sir, - In last year's register of MPs interests, our MP is reported to have earned around £500,000 plus his salary for representing us in Parliament. It is assumed that he can afford to pay his council tax.

Now over many years his constituents have had great difficulty in meeting these outrageous payments. Perhaps William could put his mind to methods of reducing these onerous taxes?

GEORGE HAYES

Maison Dieu,

Richmond.