I HAVE enjoyed reading the Examiner these last few weeks with all the different stories concerning the snow and ice from ‘our snow heroes’, council gritters and of course the mailbag.
The snow has caused chaos and affected us all in many different ways, but this week as I have watched and read about the devastation caused by the Haiti earthquake I think it’s finally time to put things in perspective.
So let’s all be positive and move on from the recent bad weather, but keep your pens handy as we might be in for a red hot summer this year, and that should bring a lot more chaos.
I would also like to mention what a great job Mrs Martin and her staff are doing at Rowley Lane J and I School. It has been able to remain open for the last two weeks.
Miss A Tyrell
Lepton
Good use of money
AFTER WEDNESDAY, January 13, ‘Black Ice Day’, it is imperative that Kirklees Council make more funds available for grit supply wagons, more if required, and grit men, plus storage for grit.
The council’s main aim should be to keep our roads safe.
We pay our rates and feel money would be well spent on gritting etc, not on expensive Christmas lights, or the unnecessary revamping of the train station forecourt, with stupid water features, which I am sure are a safety hazard.
Also how is it that Kirklees are short of grit when street sellers are offering it at the side of our roads at £5 per bag?
Come on Kirklees, put our money to good use please.
Norma
Netherton
Snow management
IN REPLY to Stephen Clancy’s letter (January 9) on weather moans, I can’t comment on Moscow or Stockholm, but I was in Helsinki for five days just before Christmas.
Apparently, they don’t get much snow in the city but there was a moderate covering. I heard plenty of complaints about the weather and the cold – in perfect English of course.
It was -12ºC but the people of Helsinki kept moving on their winter tyres and it also has a tram system. I’d like to return one day, preferably in the summer!
Mrs B F Alexander
Meltham
Well-fought fight
CONGRATULATIONS to all those who have fought so hard to prevent the closure of Castle Hall School (Examiner, January 13).
It would have been a tragedy for the pupils who have worked so hard to bring the school to its excellent status in the league.
Well done everyone.
Brian Lawrence
Golcar
Proper English
WHILE going out and about nowadays the language we hear can be quite amusing.
When you see someone you know, you get ‘hi’, when people need to attract someone’s attention it’s usually in a loud voice ‘oi hi’. If one needs things from certain shops, it’s ‘oh I’m just wanting a few bits.’ When leaving someone you know, it’s ‘see yer’ or ‘see yer in a bit’ . The word ‘amazing’ is mostly overused. The most frequent of course is ‘but’ which peppers almost every statement.
Is this, however amazing, the start of a complete change in our use of words?
It has been reported that text speak and slang will, if studied by teenagers, be enough to gain an English GCSE.
Surely the absolute priority is for children to firstly acquire a good grounding in the English language and be able to speak it properly?
One might ask, is the text speak and slang another downside of technology? If it takes off, to a very high degree could we be in danger of losing the English language as we have know it forever.
Brenda Holroyd
Netherthong
Thanks for help
ON December 29 my wife Dorothy fell heavily near Huddersfield market, bruising her face and dislocating her shoulder.
I would like to thank the passers-by who helped her whilst waiting for an ambulance, the person who went to the library to find me and the doctors and nurses who looked after her at the Royal Infirmary.
Dorothy is recovering well and wishes all involved a Happy New Year.
George A Brown
Beaumont Park
Friends and relatives
THE LETTER from someone in Halifax concerned about the welfare of an elderly great aunt over Christmas was very interesting.
I am sure the elderly relative would be very grateful for the concern shown for her. I am an elderly great aunt, isolated, with health problems. I have relatives living not so far away as Halifax.
However, I have heard nothing whatsoever from my relatives over Christmas and the snowy weather, not even a phone call.
At these times supportive, helpful friends are very valuable. I have been extremely grateful for mine. It’s a funny old world. As the elderly aunts might say: ‘There’s nowt as queer as folk!’
Deserted
Skelmanthorpe
A healthy response
IN OCTOBER I had a cataract removed in the Day Surgery Unit at the Huddersfield Royal Infirmary.
The attitude of the staff was admirable. They were unfailingly attentive, helpful and supportive. They are a great credit to the ophthalmology department, to HRI, to the town of Huddersfield and the NHS.
If every section of the NHS operated in the same helpful, pleasant manner we would be the envy of the world. Regrettably it doesn’t.
Grateful Patient
Skelmanthorpe
Trouble on the buses
ON October 31 my letter in the Examiner predicted trouble for the buses in that specific place at St George’s Square in winter time. I asked who would be paying for accident compensation.
It was ridiculed by another letter writer in November to which I replied that only time will show the results. I mentioned the cost of the square’s revamp, £4m, plus the £50,000-plus a year maintenance which would have to be paid by no other than the council taxpayer.
Only six weeks have passed and we have had already two bus accidents, one with passengers injured.This will presumably cost money to settle.
As council taxpayers we could do without that extra burden in the present economic situation created by our council which closes libraries, tourist information centre and other public facilities.
Tony Sosna
Huddersfield
Warming to a theme
HAVING no contingency plans for dealing with extreme weather in the winter shows a council believing its own hype regarding global warming.
Allen Jenkinson
Milnsbridge
Silly drinking game
WHY all this fuss about a silly drinking game? Surely anyone with a half a brain will see it for the harmless bit of fun it really is.
Just because it’s upset a few old fossils doesn’t mean we have to demonise these people as Nazis, does it?
Simon Softe
(By email)
Service not resumed
UNCERTAINTY remains about whether there will be a rise in the council tax in Kirklees unlike in Calderdale where the rate is to go down.
We on Saxton Place at Almondbury should have our tax cut by 50% because we certainly do not get a service from Kirklees.
The last time our bins where emptied was December 8, 2009. The council just use the excuse that the snow stopped them from getting up our street.
Well, there is no snow now but they still have not emptied the bins.
The refuse collectors are just doing a cosmetic job of clearing the main street, so any one going past will look and say how clean it is.
If you get off the main road it would seem there is no attempt at clearing any bins backlog.
In addition, last August everybody on Saxton Place got a letter to say they were going to resurface the road. We are still waiting for it to happen.
Next they will say they have no money.
I have reported my concerns to my councillor but have made no progress.
So do not talk to me about council tax rises when we already do not get our money’s worth.
Peter
Almondbury
