06/10/05

Every year in the North-East, normal working class people from one year to the next prepare for the annual leek/flower/veg shows and proudly exhibit their produce. These shows create a lot of community spirit.

But one allotment grower showed me some plots where produce had been abandoned and people had lost interest.

These people spend a fortune on nurturing and caring for their produce.

I believe that they have been offered no alternative site, no compensation and the owners have been nowhere near.

Wouldn't you have thought that the local authority would have tried to keep the local spirit in the community going?

If we start to lose it then there will be no shows to look at local peoples' achievements, people will not socialise as much and we will lose that community spirit for good.

I am not a gardener but I will support these people 100 per cent. Let's stand up to the big boys and show them what community spirit means. - John Bailey, Liberal Democrat candidate Howden Ward, Crook.

AIRPORT NAME

FOR some time now I have enjoyed reading the letters from Chris Wardell, sometimes amusing, most times informative, but not his letter about our airport (HAS, Sept, 18).

He, like many others, has fallen into the trap about the name of our local airport. He has forgotten that Durham is the name of the county as well as the city.

Maybe it would have been better if the airport had been named after the two counties then there would have not been such confusion.

How does North Yorkshire, Durham Airport or Durham, North Yorkshire Airport grab you Chris?

Or would you like Cleveland being brought in as well? At least anyone who can find their way around by reading a map would get a better idea of its location. - ME Harris, Darlington.

TOWN CLERK

CAN I say how disgusted I am with the Labour (more like Victorian workhouse owners) Party in Thornaby and the way they have treated their former town clerk, (Echo Sept 28).

Having read previously in The Northern Echo about this debacle, at last the truth has come out. This group of councillors is a disgrace and the people of Thornaby deserve the resignations of these councillors.

I am also disgusted that they seem to think that because there is money in reserve they have the right to assume they can use it to bail themselves out. I say no, let it come from their own pockets. - Dave Brown, Thornaby-on-Tees.

HAVING read about the £45,000 bill for the town clerk in Thornaby, I was amazed at the chairperson's reply.

Surely the chairperson should be trying to make the Labour councillors responsible for this cost to foot the bill and not to be taking money out of the precept payers' reserves.

There should be resignations. I would start with the chair and then ask all the Labour councillors who took part in any discussion or voted on any aspect of this issue to step down immediately. - John Scott, Thornaby.

TONY BLAIR

THE writer of the Comment column, (Echo, Sept 28) who wrote: "that Tony Blair sounded and looked like a man in full control of his party, his country and his future", seems to have been mesmerised by the medium of television into believing that he has some messianic power, which is what the speech writers had intended he should portray.

Mr Blair is also recognised as a world leader, especially when he chairs G8 summit meetings, so careful consideration should be given to his speech and the contradictions in it.

He praised Neil Kinnock for being his mentor in the art of leadership but Mr Kinnock was the man who, every time Mrs Thatcher reached for her handbag, dropped to his knees and took a count of nine.

Mr Blair told his audience to raise their sights to a world "indifferent to tradition, unforgiving of frailty, no respecter of past reputations". The opportunities of globalisation, he said, "would only go to those swift to adapt, slow to complain, open, willing and able to change". It was a rousing speech from a man who had recently been toasting his hosts in Beijing.

There is another world leader with a regular audience living in the foothills of the Himalayas in India who will have a different view of the speech. His people long for freedom of choice and the opportunity to develop their talents but are being denied their human rights because of gradual ethnic cleansing. - Thomas Conlon, Spennymoor.

WHITE HORSE HOTEL

I WAS present at the recent Darlington Planning Committee meeting which approved an application to demolish the White Horse Hotel and replace it with apartments.

I was shocked by the advice given by the officers. I am not surprised the residents are considering appealing to the Ombudsman.

The loss of a 40-bed hotel is surely contrary to the town plan to encourage tourism. It also deprives local residents of a valued community facility. My main concern, however, is the developer's proposed car parking scheme, which the officers described as "a novel solution".

I can only assume they meant novel as in "fictional". It is patently impractical. Indeed, in my days as a practising engineer we would have described it as "a back of the fag packet scheme" ie not properly thought through.

The members had only a short time to study the plans and were advised by the officers to accept an untried system. Before recommending approval it is surely the officers' responsibility to ensure car parking provision is satisfactory, workable and will be used.

Finally, the committee was told Harrowgate Farm was the only development in the area. It was not advised that the council is also considering selling redundant educational land in Glebe Road for redevelopment.

There is a great deal of residential development taking place across the town at the moment - do we really need to squeeze yet more in, against the wishes of the local people? - Brian Fiske, Vice Chairman, Darlington Liberal Democrats.

POOR SHOW

AFTER attending a horse show in Northumberland recently, which was in a lovely setting with friendly competitors enjoying their native ponies, I felt in a buoyant mood as I drove home across the moors.

I had forgotten what time of year it was.

The shooting season. All around Allendale were squashed bodies of pheasants on the roads. There was at least 100 on one stretch and traffic sped past me regardless as I slowed to a crawl to avoid countless young birds not yet with their adult feathers, criss-crossing the road.

These birds will have been reared in huge sheds then turned out in the last few weeks to be murdered by people with guns. It is easy to target something which doesn't fight back. - M Embling, Crook.