COME on Kali – how can you and your fellow MP Barry Sheerman be so brass necked to vote with your Government for post office closures and then tell the public that you will try to do all you can to save those served with closure notices?

You voted knowing full well that many post offices in your own constituencies would face closure.

I recall that some years ago you were very keen to try to take all the credit for transferring Holmbridge post office from the old site in Holmbridge to its present one but now you are stabbing them in the back with your vote.

I despair that Wooldale Co-operative Society and Post Office is on your hit list – this facility serves the community very well. There is no bus service here to take people down to Holmfirth so if it were to close it would simply cause extra expense and worry to those residents without a car. Closure will also mean loss of jobs and a decline in profitability of an independent Co-op shop which is the life-blood of this community.

You then have the gall to ask Kirklees Council to pick up the pieces.

If your government, with all the extra taxes you have created over the past few years, cannot afford to subsidise the post office (which is currently running at millions of pounds) our rate payers cannot be expected to do so – imagine the massive hike in council tax that would be needed to accommodate that?

No Kali and Barry – the buck stops with you and your Government.

Of course, at the moment Mr Sheerman is trying to bury all the bad news by jumping up and down about Tesco. And to think you were supposed to be the ‘party of the people’.

Clr Ken Sims

Conservative Councillor for Holme Valley South Ward and Cabinet Member for Regeneration

Will Kirklees Council never learn?

WEDNESDAY’S Examiner provides object lessons in the quiet ways Kirklees Council squanders money. Nearly £3 for every household in Kirklees on the Tesco and Queensgate studies and £35,000 on the Flockton bypass study, all of which might never come to pass.

It’s no secret that Kirklees is about to spend lots more money objecting to the extension of Kingsgate because they know that if the Kingsgate plans are passed it’ll nail their Queensgate plans, but what’s bizarre is that Kirklees Council actually has a 10% share in Kingsgate – cutting its own throat!

Even more strange is that apparently Kirklees has never had any financial return from Kingsgate – all the money’s gone on interest etc, so will Queensgate ever make money?

A number of years ago Kirklees’ cycling department decided that a Colne Valley Greenway would be a good idea, most of which would run on the canal towpath.

Several people raised reservations about plans to mix pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders on a path barely six feet wide in places.

At a public meeting I asked if it might be a good idea to secure British Waterways’ agreement on the plans first, having had several years’ worth of communications with that most obstructive, inefficient and bureaucratic body. No worries, Kirklees was “in discussion” with BW and “confident”.

Two or three years later British Waterways refused to cooperate – a show-stopper and the project was sacked. Cost: £38,000.

Pointless saying “I told you so” or “they never learn”, because however often you tell them they still never learn.

Richard Huddleston

West Slaithwaite

Dumbing down is a disservice

THE article by Denis Kilcommons (Examiner August 11) “Spellbound by the Magic of Words”, was very amusing, in parts, but one wonders if, during its compilation, it struck him that only those who can spell and understand the meaning of words would appreciate it?

Since the sole purpose of language is communication, misspelling of words, which can change the meaning completely, negates that very purpose.

The suggestion by Dr Ken Smith, to accept some of the more common misspells as genuine, is merely a cop-out to get the Education Establishment off the hook of its failure to carry out its prime function. Why is he not raising merry hell about the lack of rigour in the teaching which is failing his students?

There was an illuminating article, by a marker of SATS, of 10 years experience, in the Spectator, of July 26. She had been ordered, by her superior, to mark as correct an answer “Her”, when the correct answer was “Air”. The reason given, by the superior, was that “the pupil may be from Liverpool”!

It seems that the “dumbing down” takes place in the marking, as well as the questions.

A-level results came out this week and, no doubt, the politicians will be trumpeting yet another improvement. But how can we believe them when, as a country, we are steadily dropping down the international tables in literacy and numeracy?

All this fiddling of the results, in one way or another, to meet targets, set by politicians, and to gratify their egos, is doing a gross disservice, not only to the pupils who genuinely attain high standards, but also those given artificially high marks, who, having been given an inflated idea of their abilities, receive rude awakenings as they progress through life.

A L Jones

Holmfirth

EU and party politics

I HAVE been following the correspondence between Mr Schofield/Armer/Dorril with some interest. Mr Schofield suggests that Mr Dorril’s views on Europe are defined by his party politics which is clearly nonsensical when there are pro and anti-European views in all parties.

For example Mr Armer is anti-European and was a Conservative candidate in the recent local elections, yet Ken Clarke, Michael Heseltine, Geoffrey Howe and many other Conservatives are pro-European, with a similar situation pertaining in the Labour Party, whilst the most pro-European are the Lib Dems.

Let’s not forget Mrs Thatcher, who signed the Single European Act and John Major the Maastricht Treaty, both of which took Britain further and deeper into Europe than any Treaty before or since. There was no referendum on these and neither was there when Ted Heath took Britain into Europe. The reason why, is because each of these are Treaties for which European rules do not demand a referendum.

I have always had concerns regarding the democratic deficit within the European Union, but the recent Lisbon Treaty addressed some of these concerns.

For example, the Treaty gives more power to the parliament of elected MEPs and also to the Council of Ministers which is made up of Ministers from each of the member states, all of whom of course are democratically elected. Also for the first time, each member of parliament must be consulted on any new legislation prior to it being discussed/agreed in the European Parliament. So it’s rather ironic that this treaty has caused so much angst when others did not.

Had it not been for the Single European Act and Maastricht, the current post office closure programme is unlikely to have come about for it was these which brought competition and harmonisation into the postal service. So whilst I am not involved with any political party, I do respect the views of Mr Dorril who does back them up with facts while Mr Armer and Schofield use only their own prejudice.

Mr A Martin

Huddersfield

Low-paid staff also count

IN July council staff took industrial action. These included school workers, carers and many others, on just above the minimum wage. If the minimum wage workers were graded at the same grade as binmen and perhaps others which is £8 an hour it would help.

My mum has carers, while they were on strike I covered for them, as we support them.

The other week my mum got a letter from Kirklees hoping she was not without support. How much did this cost Kirklees? Money that could have gone to the low-paid. I was quite concerned to read in the Examiner the other night about 272 workers at Kirklees who are on above £50k. My answer to that is give the minimum wage earners their pay rise Kirklees. Everybody who works for Kirklees, Clr Light, needs rewarding for their jobs, are you saying the lower paid are not as important as your top dogs? The lower-paid need rewarding as well? Clr Light, in supporting the £50k salaries said those who received them were the best possible people. Where does that leave the low-paid, Clr Light? Are they not the best workers as well?

Maureen Javin

Kirkburton