YEP Letters: March 7

First class waste of money

Martin J Phillips, Cookridge

I would like to advise your readers that they are wasting money buying first class stamps.

Even if they are fortunate to catch the last post – which in many areas is now 9am – the chances of their letter(s) being delivered by the following day in negligible.

Where I live the nearest letter box is emptied between 9am and 10am, but instead of taking the collected mail to the sorting office, the van driver then spends the next four hours or so delivering mail to properties in this area.

The collected mail is consequently not taken to the sorting office til mid-afternoon at the earliest.

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An attack by global forces on people of Leeds

Rev Robin Paterson, Leeds 15

I am amazed that there has been no response by correspondents to letters following the news that the landlord Regus at Burley Place business park has increased the rents to flood hit businesses by up to 78 per cent.

Incidentally, this company`s profits rose by 47 per cent last year! This is an attack by the global rich on hard working and long established Leeds firms located at Burley Place.

The landlord left tenants to clean up with the help of volunteers and grants from Leeds City Council. This is an attack by global forces on the people of Leeds who will be deprived of the skills and products of these businesses should they be forced to close because of landlord greed.

It is also a smack in the face for local voluntary and entrepeneurial energy. If those firms go out of business, their competitors will gain.

This country is more and more becoming structured to break the spirit of the little man (and woman) and favour the global enterprises that suck up the customer base that is becoming removed by stages from the (often foreign owned) supplier of those services.

It is interesting to note that Regus took Burley Park over from a previous owner. Little people need to beware that there are far darker forces at work than the EU (or those who promote exit), the debate about which is a clever distraction. The action by Regus against local business is a manifestation of those forces that have nothing to do with whether or not we are members of the EU.

Interested readers might want to track down Fred Harrison of the Land Research Trust of London in his latest book “As Evil Does”.

In the meantime, visit, encourage and use your local business people.

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A leap into the dark?

Derek Barker, Moortown

The argument continues between the EU in/out supporters with David Cameron insisting that to vote out would be a leap into the dark.

The one thing that he is conveniently overlooking is that we took that leap into the dark 40 years ago when we voted to join the EU. At the time we were not told that there was a hidden agenda to create a European super-state in which the authority of our own government would be reduced to that of little more than a parish council, with major policy decisions being by a small clique of unelected bankers and globalist business leaders with puppet MEPs to create the impression that the EU parliament is a democratic institution.

Or that millions of manufacturing jobs would have to go down the pan because the EU parliament can dictate which countries we can and cannot export our manufactured goods to. Or that EU citizens coming into this country would be given priority over affordable social housing school placements and NHS treatment.

We were conned into joining the EU by being told it was simply a measure that would enable this country to carry out trade much more easily with the rest of Europe by removing the trading barriers and in effect removing the borders between the countries of Europe and that is all that we were told.

We were conned into joining the EU in the first place and now David Cameron and his stay in cronies are using scaremongering tactics to con us into staying in the EU. What David Cameron doesn’t say is that the so called piecemeal reforms he has negotiated mean absolutely nothing because they have not been ratified by either the EU parliament or the European Courts, and they can be rejected by the rest of the EU after the referendum if we vote to stay in.

Rip-off merchants

Ernest Lundy, by email

If we are supposed to be in an improving state economically, why is it that interest on investment savings continues to decline?

Or is it just hogwash? For some time now the Bank of England has been dangling the carrot of a rise in the base rate, yet it has continually been put aside. Savers have seen the average rate of interest drop from around two or three per cent (if one could get that) to 1.4 per cent over the last two years, taxed at 20 per cent before receipt. They can fool some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time. The sheriff of Nottingham was a pussy cat compared with our bankers today. Just rip-off merchants. Would it be far off the truth to suggest that savers are being used as ‘fall-guys’ by banks and building societies for the repayment of misssold PPIs in the recent past? Nothing new about that then!

Airport plan ‘white elephant’

B Duffy, by email

It seems somewhat ironic that your headline, ’Airport reveals 2030 masterplan,’ should occur on a day when the airport is once again closed because of its being at the mercy of the weather. due to its extreme location.

I have been advocating for the airport to be moved to Church Fenton since the 1970s, when the RAF station was being mothballed and there was talk of Yeadon Airport’s runway being extended. The then Minister of Transport, Peter Walker, toured the area and flew over the surrounding countryside.

He said then that only an idiot would dream of expanding an airport in this location, due to the poor road links, housing, but mostly its altitude.

I don’t believe that conventional trains are capable of scaling the gradient from the Leeds/Harrogate line without miles of track being laid to reduce the scale of the climb to the airport, or by tunnelling, which would be even more expensive.

I don’t believe that another penny of ratepayers money should be spent on further development of this white elephant project. If the airport wants to go ahead, let them put their money where their mouth is! Unless Leeds City Council have an ulterior motive in driving through a new road to the airport in order to build further houses and industrial units on the green belt land surrounding the airport. This would push even more traffic onto the already congested roads and swamp the schools and surgeriesin Horsforth, Yeadon and Bramhope.

The only solution is to develop either Robin Hood or Church Fenton, both of which have existing runways, are near to both major motorways and rail links and leave Leeds/Bradford to its flying club, which it was originally intended. Or would this dent some councillors inflated egos?

Born to be different

Jack Banner, Meanwood

I have just watched a programme ‘Called Born To Be Different’ on Channel 4.

It was billed as a programme about people with disabilities, in fact it was a massive endorsement of the abilities of people facing physical and psychological challenges. In the past I have worked in this sector and found it immensely rewarding. We should respect people for what they can do, not what they cannot.

Roll on the referendum

P D Hainsworth, Armley

The EU has not had its accounts approved by auditors for almost 20 years, how come the BBC never mentions this in its EU referendum coverage?

I wouldn’t invest in a bank in a similar position and fail to see how any country would want to be part of such a union. Roll on referendum day!