IT IS, I think, very unfortunate that the public meeting called and organised by Colne Valley MP, Jason McCartney to discuss proposals for the two developments on Lindley Moor should be jeopardised because of irrelevant political concerns about the chairmanship of the meeting.
Surely the many concerned people of whatever party or group desire only to have an opportunity to air their views and to present a unified front in opposition to these ill-conceived proposals.
Clrs Stanfield and Burke should be very careful about bringing a political dimension into the arena.
Indulging in political sniping at this stage achieves nothing and distracts from what should be a common aim to bring about an outcome which benefits present and future residents of Lindley.
The Lindley Moor Action Group have done sterling work in keeping the issue of Lindley Moor in the forefront of public consciousness, but they should not feel themselves pressurised into chairing the meeting where they will have every opportunity of presenting their views.
United front – or divide and rule!
Barbara Allonby
Lindley
Meeting point
I AM amazed at the sheer nerve and brass neck demonstrated by Clr Stanfield over the chairmanship of a public meeting called by Jason McCartney.
He recognised the public anger over the decision approved by Clr Stanfield and others on Kirklees Council, to build on Lindley Moor. He called for and organised a public meeting. He is the sitting MP. If he is not capable of chairing such an important meeting, who is?
Maybe Clr Stanfield should have called for such a meeting in the first place, and then we would have taken her calls for an independent chair more seriously!
Trevor Woolley
Linthwaite
Budget control
WELL, yet another jewel in Kirklees crown goes awry. (Council step in to finish park job, Examiner, July 5).
When are the powers that be going to realise that we have enough well-equipped and reliable local firms that can carry out any major building work without having to bring in people from other parts of the country?
It appears that anything the council has a hand in now turns into a disaster. Heaven help us when and if the new sports centre gets the go-ahead.
Why can’t Tesco be given the ultimatum to build us a sports centre at their expense before they are allowed to start their own development?
That may give them the encouragement to get the job done on time and on budget, something which seems to have no chance of happening with the council we have at the present.
Pat
Newsome
Called to account
I REFER to articles in The Examiner over the past two days.
So much money has been wasted by Kirklees Council in siting useless wind turbines, blunders in road markings, incorrect bollard location, problems with Greenhead Park contracts and of course the St George’s Square fiasco.
Private businesses are not allowed to make mistakes without serious consequences. What about the decision makers in Kirklees?
S M A
Huddersfield
Private parking charges
REFERRING to the parking dispute with Great Northern Retail Park car park managers UKCPS (Examiner July 6), a recent feature in a national daily paper revealed how a victim of an excessive parking charge was advised by a law firm to refuse to pay and offer to go to court. The charge was eventually dropped, although not without many dire threats.
The lawyers in that case are campaigning against such charges and reason that a court would declare them to be extortion.
This would bring the whole rotten business crashing down, so the parking companies will not go to court.
Could we have some expert legal opinion on the situation?
RS
Holmfirth
Bombardier disaster
WHAT an absolute disgrace that our government has allowed the contract for rolling stock at Bombardier, Derby, to go to a German company. The knock-on effect is probably 20,000 jobs to go.
If the situation were reversed, the French and the German governments would procure these contracts for their own workers. But there again the French and Germans own large swathes of our rail network.
Shadow business secretary John Denham said it is ‘not too late’ for the Government to review the Thameslink contract, calling the decision a ‘body blow’ for British manufacturing.
But Mr Hammond, the business secretary, told Sky News that was ‘not an option’. He claimed the Government had been left with little choice because of the terms of the procurement process devised by the previous Labour administration, and added it is something he wants to change for future major projects to ensure Britain is competing on a ‘level playing field’.
What a load of weak people our MPs are. Who is running this country, our elected government or unelected Europeans?
It’s time the people demanded the referendum on the EU we have been promised and which is long overdue.
Mally
Netherthong
Great entertainment
ALTHOUGH not a major tennis fan, I really enjoyed Wimbledon fortnight this year and the coverage and commentaries on BBC1 and BBC2 were of the usual high standard.
One thing that occurred to me several times during the two weeks was how different the behaviour of spectators and participants is, when contrasted with football for example.
No spitting, bad language, obscene gestures or racial taunts at Wimbledon. No sporting prima donnas basking in self-adulation or over-the-top exuberance. No poor sportsmanship, purposeful fouling or cheating. No exaggerated chewing of gum, aggressive body language or tantrums. No coin throwing, court invasion or threatening behaviour.
Just thousands of people enjoying the excellent sport and entertainment on offer, generally behaving themselves and supporting talented and sportsmanlike players from other countries, as well as their own.
The best of British really. Shame the same can’t be said about some other sports.
Mr Grumpy
Almondbury
Happy memories
I HAVE not lived in Huddersfield for 49 years, and have lived in Canada since 1967, but I do like to keep abreast of Huddersfield events through the “Examiner” on line.
It troubled me to read the items about the proposed development of Clayton Fields, but it also brought back a flood of memories about them.
Tobogganing in the winters of the late 1940’s was fun, but my toboggan was not very good.
One day I went down the hill as a twosome on a faster and better model. As we reached the bottom of the hill, my partner rolled off with a shout to me to do the same! I didn’t realise that we were almost in the stream.
As I rolled off, I immediately heard the splash of the toboggan entering the stream! Lots of fun times!
That stream bank had wasps’ nests in it, as we discovered one day, when we poked around with a stick or two. All of us were stung, one young girl quite badly.
Over the stream and up the hill was, as I recall, a football pitch, and we spent hours with an old leather football playing attack and defence.
Just beyond the football pitch was the entrance to “Spider Alley”, which led up to Halifax Road, Edgerton. High stone walls and a steady curve made it that you were hidden to others until they were right in front of you. An ideal spot for courting couples I understood!
These are simple memories of a simpler time, but I am sure that Clayton Fields today, is as much fun as I found it over 60 years ago, and I hope that the development can be stopped, and the fields remain an open space for all to enjoy.
Rodney Senior
Hampton, New Brunswick, Canada.
Bustling Bury
AS I walk through and drive through Huddersfield I find myself constantly depressed by the litter and general rundown nature of my hometown.
Today I visited Bury expecting to find it similarly rundown, I must confess.
How surprised I was therefore to find that Bury is cleaner, tidier and seemingly more cared-for than Huddersfield.
The market was alive and buzzing and the covered market was positively heaving and there wasn’t an empty unit to be seen!
How different from our own covered market which seems to be dying by degrees. Perhaps some sort of delegation could be sent to find out how and why Bury has succeeded where Huddersfield has not.
Mrs JE Barff
Slaithwaite
