I SPENT 25 years as a tanker driver and frequently carried hazardous chemicals, including phenol, which is the chemical reported to be involved in the closure of the Channel Tunnel.

I am amazed that this substance was allowed on to a train along with other traffic under circumstances which, if true, allowed the carrying vehicle to overturn during transit.

If memory serves me well, when carrying this product we were barred from passing through many of the shorter tunnels in Britain, such as those going under rivers.

Other times we were only allowed through accompanied by a police escort vehicle. We were also required to carry breathing apparatus on the vehicle and full protective chemical suits. Phenol can kill within minutes of contact with the skin. The fumes given off in a fire are extremely toxic.

The toxic fumes released within a restricted area such as the Channel Tunnel are capable of killing anyone trapped in there.

There must be an immediate investigation, preceded by preventive action by the Government department charged with overseeing public safety, and a ban on such deadly cargoes.

Had there been a passenger train in the tunnel at the same time the end result could have been catastrophic.

John Langford

Lepton

Complexity of the universe

I’M sure we are all aware that the world’s best scientific brains are trying to understand the mysteries of the universe, particularly the basic structure of matter which we think comprises protons, electrons, atoms, plus things like quarks and possibly some other particles that we don’t yet even know about.

These particles have quite happily existed and obeyed certain laws for millions of years, without any help from mankind, and enable houses, cars, computers, diamonds, trees, human beings etc. to exist.

Is it remotely conceivable that at the moment of creation these particles just accidentally came together and behaved in a manner which we still cannot understand?

Or could it be that something or someone created these incredible structures and that the ordinary human mind cannot possibly comprehend the complexity and meaning of it all?

John Startin

Huddersfield

Future of Mirfield schools

AS a resident of Mirfield and an ex-pupil of Castle Hall School I find it disturbing that Kirklees Council is proposing to close one of the best and highest-achieving schools in the area.

The council press release states that only half the pupils who go to Castle Hall and Mirfield Free Grammar live in Mirfield. Surely this is a credit to the quality and reputation of the school, that parents from other parts of Kirklees want to send their children to Castle Hall rather than schools in their own area?

And surely by extending the facilities at Mirfield Free Grammar would mean that even less of a percentage attending the school are from Mirfield?

The press release also says that schools are supposed to be for local children and the local community. If schools were all of the same standard then maybe parents would send their children to their local schools rather than ones in other towns.

After all, a parent will send their child to the school they believe would be best for their children’s education, not necessarily the location of the school.

Perhaps the millions of pounds should be spent improving existing schools, to enable local children to attend their local school, rather than spend it on new “super schools” that we don’t know actually work. And by closing schools it takes away the choice of a local school for some.

If these proposals do go ahead the disruption to pupils during the transition between schools will be damaging. I was a pupil at Knowle First School, Mirfield (now Mirfield Community Centre) when the school closed. The pupils were distributed between Crowlees and Crossley Fields. Settling into new surroundings as well as many new people is difficult. How would this affect pupils studying for their GSCEs?

Surely smaller schools are better. Fewer pupils in classrooms means more concentration and better learning methods. Also, there is a better sense of community at a smaller school.ŠCastleŠHall offers a wide range of lessons, especially foreign languages, more than other schools offer.

The location of Castle Hall is also preferable to that of Mirfield Free Grammar; it is set back from busy roads and houses. As a resident of Kitson Hill Road I see the disruption on a morning and afternoon as students arrive and leave Mirfield Free Grammar. Doubling the number of pupils here would make this situation worse.

And what would happen to the teachers? Would all jobs be secure?

Name and address supplied

Bugs in our hospitals

I HAVE recently received Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust’s review of its services during the year 2007-8.

I note that there is no mention in its self-congratulatory account of the position regarding hospital acquired infections (headlined “Beating the Bugs”) of the fact that following the year at issue it was censored by the official watchdog Monitor, as reported in the Examiner, for failing (by 40%) to meet the target it was set for reducing MRSA superbug infections.

Such complacent failure to answer serious criticism, also demonstrated following concerns re hospital hygiene reported by the Patient and Public Involvement in Health Forum is surely unacceptable.

I believe it is no coincidence that the trust is as stated in its review, among the first to be provided with the latest hospital cleaning technology, which is clearly badly needed.

Let us hope it is put to good use.

Dr Bob Heys

Formerly chairman of Calderdale’s Huddersfield PPIH Hospital Forum.

Brown and fuel prices

CAN anyone come up with the real reason for the continuous rises in energy and fuel prices, apart from the obvious one of greed? Recently energy companies have been lambasted for their increase in dividend payouts – £257m last year – to shareholders.

Gordon Brown is at a total loss – nothing unusual there – as to how to bring the energy companies in line. He talked about a windfall tax on profits, but the same old rhetoric was issued to the Government and public that these obscene profits were needed for investment into new forms of energy.

Does this mean that these companies are going to fully fund the building of nuclear reactors? Or will they be looking for some Government handout?

We have now been told that Gordon Brown will not be issuing a hardship payment; instead he is looking to improve insulation in homes. And after we have fully insulated our homes and our energy bills are still sky-high, what then?

Margaret Thatcher made a huge mistake when she privatised the energy and water companies. If Gordon Brown can waste public money to bail out a badly-run bank (Northern Rock) I think it is high time that we thought about getting the energy and water companies back into public hands.

Water and energy are the fundamentals in life; why should we be held to ransom for something that keeps body and soul together?

It is about time our leaders started to earn their corn.

R J Bray

Shelley

Scar of child poverty

EARLIER this year Gordon Brown said: “Child poverty is the scar that demeans Britain. When we allow just one life to be degraded or derailed by early poverty, it represents a cost that can never be fully counted.”

He is right. As millions of poor children begin the school term not only will they have to battle with the degradation their parents face from not being able to afford school uniform and the bullying that can arise from not “fitting in”, they will be fighting not to be derailed by their circumstances as they work through the National Curriculum.

This is just one of the battles they face, day in, day out.

Child poverty is not just about money. It is about poverty of health, education and choice.

And it doesn’t just affect the disadvantaged – it affects the whole of society.

This is not what we want for others or ourselves.

That is why we are calling on people to back our plea to Gordon Brown to keep the promise that the Government made to end child poverty.

We have signed the Campaign to End Child Poverty’s petition calling on Gordon Brown not to lose sight of his own cause and we want others to help us by doing the same.

UK Youth Parliament

Stile Common Junior School, Newsome, Barton Hill Primary School and Children’s Centre, Bristol, Hurlingham and Chelsea School, London

Just another rehash

GORDON Brown has unveiled a scheme for the insulation of properties to alleviate the rising fuel bills, but more importantly to save his own skin with the unions. Surely this is a rehash of previous measures and the ongoing council schemes, one of which is running in Kirklees.

Good old Gordon, the master of the rehash and the sleight of hand. He’s re-announced more rehashed expenditure measures throughout his career, staged at intervals hoping we will all forget, than sleazy Blair had staged photo opportunities.

The man and his cronies should seek psychiatric help for their self-delusion and memory loss.

Everything has to be paid for by the taxpayer and I guess we have all had enough of the stealth taxes, waste, creation of non-jobs, the fraudulent EU, idiotic banks, the John Lewis list, immigration, laws to hit the minor transgressor (while serious crime gets sidelined) etc... Will the Tories be any different? I doubt it; they are in the same cushy club.

And while the country struggles with the continuing economic fallout of incompetent financial institutions and Government Harriet Harman worries herself into a fit about equality and imposing more burden on employers.

What’s up luv; don’t career politicians get it? Business needs less interference and less taxation and none of this overbearing nonsense from smug, dictatorial, po-faced political careerists about forcing positive discrimination by statute does nothing for equality. It really is time to ensure that people elected to Parliament are limited to two terms and actually have experience of real life and work beforehand.

Gez Sharp

Huddersfield