Hear All Sides

COUNTRY SPORTS

TONY Kelly claims country sports enthusiasts don't care about the countryside (HAS, Aug 21).

Country pursuits such as fishing, hunting and shooting make a significant and important contribution to the biodiversity of the countryside and are, by practice, carefully integrated into wider countryside management. This is widely recognised by academics, environmentalists and botanists.

Anglers are the watchdogs of rivers and lakes and, over generations, have cared for and loved the waters in which they fish - campaigning for increased water quality and against pollution.

Hunts are actively involved in the management of hedgerows and broadleaved woodlands. In fact, the Government's own recent inquiry into hunting, the Burns Inquiry, concluded hunting has a beneficial influence on conservation. Habitats created and maintained for shooting benefit a considerable diversity of wildlife.

As well as the benefits of the environment, which are at no cost to the taxpayer, country sports have a huge input into the rural economy. There is a vast difference between people who just talk about caring for the countryside and those country sports enthusiasts who actually put it into practice and contribute to sustainable conservation and sustainable rural communities. - John Haigh, Countryside Alliance, Area Public Relations Officer, Thirsk.

TORY LEADERSHIP

SOON we will know the new leader of the Tory party. Wouldn't it be good for the country if they would choose Kenneth Clarke?

As a life-long supporter of the Labour Party I can still respect Mr Clarke's humour, intelligence and his ministerial experience.

Iain Duncan Smith is a Thatcherite, a xenophobe and, despite his claim that the Tories will now support more public services, we all know the Tories like public spending as much as turkeys like Christmas.

If elected, he will be eternally squabbling with our European friends and if he thinks he can go it alone then he is living in cloud cuckoo land. Mr Clarke will be a much more formidable opponent for Labour.

He knows our future lies in closer ties with Europe and, if he is cast out, then Tony Blair and Gordon Brown will welcome in a new era of European enlightenment with the Tories becoming political nonentities. - H Pender, Darlington.

I AM sure that many Conservative Party members wish that they were allowed to choose between more than two candidates. I would therefore like to suggest that they might prefer to take a third option and work with Charles Kennedy in the Liberal Democrats. - Robert Adamson, Darlington LibDems.

CLEVELAND POLICE

SELDOM have I read such unadulterated eye wash as the letter of CA Westberg, Media Service Manager of Cleveland Police (HAS Aug 21).

He states: "The work, successes and morale of Cleveland Police in fighting crime have not been affected by Lancet." Then why has street crime, the sort that most affects people's quality of life, soared exponentially in Middlesbrough since the start of Lancet?

He is, in fact, asking us to believe that the indefinite suspension of many experienced officers, including the most respected police officer in the country, not to mention the diversion of several million pounds of taxpayers' money from actual police work into office politics, is of no significance. I put it to him that that's humbug.

In short, I consider Mr Westberg's letter a disgrace and, as such, an accurate reflection of the state of Cleveland police. - T Kelly, Crook.

SPEED TICKETS

I FIND it disgusting that Adrian Roberts, CID Chief at Middlesbrough, escaped being prosecuted (Echo, Aug 23) after his car was snapped by a speed camera.

Is this another chapter in the Cleveland police saga or is it the case of one law for the police and another for members of the public? - A McKimm, Crook.

DERRY IRVINE

LORD Chancellor Derry Irvine is being given a £3.4m new parking area at the taxpayers' expense.

The tarmac outside his lavish apartments in the House Of Lords is being replaced with new paving and old-fashioned cobble stones which have to be laid by hand.

The same Lord Irvine sparked uproar when he redecorated his private apartment in the Lords with hand-painted wallpaper costing £350 a roll. The bill for updating the grace-and-favour flat topped £650,000.

He was also criticised early this year for spending £1,528 on two new towel rails.

Surely it could have been resurfaced with new tarmac, at less expense to the taxpayer or even received a quote from Bob the Builder. - DT Murray, Coxhoe.