05/11/03

He claims that the 13 ships are carrying over half a million tonnes of oil and fuel between them. This represents an average of over 38,000 tonnes per ship. A more likely content is a few hundred tonnes of residues, very similar to what would be in a relatively modern ship being scrapped.

Asbestos, PCBs and oil residues are common wastes, they are dealt with when any industrial plant is decommissioned and the procedures are well understood.

Don't forget that the rest of these ships contains valuable metals that can be recycled to reduce the effects of mining on the environment.

Has anyone even considered the effects on the Able employees of this work being lost? They are skilled workers who would not undertake this work if they hadn't been satisfied that they were not at risk.

I firmly believe that Friends of the Earth does a useful job monitoring potential threats to the environment, but it must learn that its arguments are not helped when facts are distorted so blatantly. - Anthony J Foster, Peterlee.

COUNCIL TAX

I SEE that the Conservatives in Bishop Auckland are advocating following Tory-dominated Kent County Council in the way it deals with council tax and councillors' expenses (HAS, Oct 27).

It would be a serious mistake if Durham were to do so. The Tories on Kent County Council have certainly floated the idea of pegging increases in council tax to inflation for pensioner taxpayers.

They are now wishing they hadn't. The idea was demolished at a meeting on September 24 of the revenue collection officers across Kent. They point out that the proposal would mean higher council tax for everyone else (including the disabled, the unemployed, those on inflation-related wage increases) in Kent; higher district council tax increases (the district councils collect council tax); and could result in the worse-off pensioners being even worse off.

Kent County Council's Tory leadership did not take a cut in their allowances in April, they merely turned down an increase which matched the increase given to the staff.

The leader of Kent County Council enjoys a pay package of £47,000 to go with his knighthood, double-barrelled surname, substantial land holdings and public school education. - Mike Eddy, Leader of the Labour Group, Kent County Council.

CONSERVATIVE PARTY

OVER the last few weeks The Northern Echo has slated the Tory conference proposals, claiming the removal of tuition fees, matching every pound we save with a pound of government money, allowing real choice over health and education and meaning business about crime and disorder are well, for the privileged few... really.

We were then called a fairly small political party and basically an irrelevance.

It has taken The Northern Echo four weeks of seemingly mass coverage of the Conservative Party to arrive at a decision of irrelevance.

If that were the case and belief of the journalist, surely a well-written sentence would suffice.

With more jobs lost this week, would it not be better that the regional paper holds to account those who run the region - the Labour Party, whose century-long control of the area has meant we are still bottom of the pile and, to many, an irrelevant region.

I await the overdue mass slating of Messrs Blair, Mandelson, Milburn, Byers, Foster, Armstrong etc. - Jim Tague, Bishop Auckland Conservatives.

THE Conservatives have comforted themselves into believing that another change of leadership will make them electable.

They make the mistake of believing that the replacement of one right-winger with another will make them attractive. They have become blind to the fact that when they were successful it was when they could attract people at the centre with pragmatic policies, which electors thought were workable.

Once electors saw in 1992 that, in terms of economic performance, the Conservatives had feet of clay, what they needed to do was to project a new view of themselves to the whole electorate. With the economy doing well under Labour they have not had the opportunity to convince people that, with them in power, things would get better.

The Labour Party has not lived up to the high expectations many people had of it. An opposition party capable of creating confidence in themselves could win the next General Election. The point is that the Conservatives fall short of the ability to take advantage of Labour's weaknesses.

There is no political inevitability that the Conservatives will come to government again. If they do not put their house in order the prospect is that the Liberal Democrats will become the main opposition and possibly a party of government.

Politics had been an art the Conservatives mastered for a long time. It was like an unequal hand a player can have in a game of mah-jong. They look pretty pathetic now that they do not have this advantage. - Geoffrey Bulmer, Billingham.

HARRY MEAD

SEVERAL readers complained that a recent article by Harry Mead was "offensive" to their Christian beliefs.

I have read many times comments by churchmen and others which are "offensive" to those with a secular belief system. Statements that those without religious beliefs are incomplete people, or have a large hole in their lives, are equally offensive.

These remarks often suggest that a morality only exists within a religious context, which quite untrue. - Eric Gendle, Middlesbrough.

HUNTING

A CORRESPONDENT (HAS, Nov 3) stated that if a group of tattooed scruffy bikers tore across the British countryside they would be arrested.

This reader should maybe study the facts instead of relying on a furtive imagination. I am myself a heavily tattooed biker who attended the Trimdon mass rally on Saturday, which was attended by the police, some equipped with cameras as well as video cameras.

I have for many years attended fox hound and beagle pack meetings, as well as coursing events in the North of England.

I attended Trimdon on Saturday to stand up for my rights and to protect a way of life as I did in the 1980s and 1990s when demonstrating with the motorcycle action group, when the government of the day was imposing new laws against the motorcycle fraternity.

Over the years I have hunted I have met some rich people as well as people from many walks of life, including solicitors, members of the armed forces, policemen, school caretakers, forklift truck drivers, factory labourers, people who have been unemployed and other tattooed bikers.

Not everybody is rich, just as all antis are not tree huggers with dreadlocks. - Name and address supplied.