Club's key contribution to town

As a member of the LMS for the past 30 years, and having held at one time or another all official management positions, I feel I have the right to reply. People such as Mr Jones would get more support if they used their common sense.

Many, many artists appearing at the club over the years have made the same joke " if the country is ever being invaded, I'm coming to the LMS, they will never find it!"

This small but important club is in a small remote area, has given much to the community and is still doing so. Our members are involved in sport as shown by your reports every Friday.

They give their time to enable youngsters, teenagers and some elderly players to participate in sport. In this day and age, this is even more important to give the kids a direction and example to look up to.

The people involved should be supported not cast aside. The club itself, with its loyal members has over the years raised thousands of pounds for charity

The ladies section works hard to raise funds to treat the members' children.

The Country and Western nights are well supported and a must for anyone wanting to experience real Westerners. Maybe they should go round to Mr Jones' house to have the concert, I'm sure the superb finale to the night would clear the wax from his ears!

How many places can you go to hire a room for a private party now in Skipton. There are the large venues, but not everyone has hundreds of friends and relatives.

The club's snooker and dominoes teams have been competing in the Skipton Leagues for many years, and the revenue gained by pubs and clubs in the town from these leagues is very important.

I could go on and on about the benefits to the town from such a club as ours, and the benefit the town has had over the years, but I think you will have got the gist by now.

It seems by the letter that Mr Jones does not like the LMS, dogs, mechanical road sweepers and cars. What the bright orange police van will look like amongst the High Street flowers is anyone's guess.

Please live in the real world Mr Jones, or become a politician.

Harry Metcalfe,

Moorview Way, Skipton

SIR - I would like to say thanks to one of your correspondents from last week - Mike Whitehead - who referred to a Volvo taking part in dangerous manoeuvres on the Silsden to Keighley dual carriageway.

We were in the Renault Clio ahead of him when Mr Whitehead saw the lunatic in the Volvo with the flashing lights overtake us on the inside before returning to the outside lane to overtake the truck that he couldn't wait for my husband to overtake first. Our first thoughts were what a shame it was that there wasn't a police car in sight when it was needed.

Our second thoughts now after reading Mr Whitehead's letter is what an even greater shame it was that this moron took us by such surprise by endangering our lives that none of us had the time to even think about taking down his numberplate so we could at least name and shame him before he actually does kill somebody.

Patricia Mason,

Greatwood Avenue, Skipton.

SIR - I see that the miserable so-and-sos of the Ribblesdale Cricket League - mostly Lancashire based - voted by 14-6 not to allow Settle CC to rearrange their fixture of April 17 because of North Ribblesdale's visit to Twickenham (Craven Diary April 16). They did at least have a vote.

Craven Cricket League (playing rule 2) states that no matches can be rearranged. Once the match dates have been fixed by the league committee then those dates will not be changed.

These dates are approved at the January meeting so, come early April, no choice, no vote.

I recall some years ago a Craven League Club being told on asking for a fixture to be rearranged because of a club football match "what has football to do with cricket?"

This letter is not a criticism of Craven Cricket League's rules. Rather there is a need for the Craven Diary to look both ways.

Mr R Townsend,

Upper Hill Way,

Salterforth

SIR - Jenny Gaiawyn uses your columns (Craven Herald April 23) to repeat a serious allegation that an American soldier shot an Iraqi civilian and cut his throat.

If Miss Gaiawyn has a shred of evidence to back up such lurid imaginings perhaps she would provide it? I won't hold my breath.

Sadly, as we have witnessed on our TV screens recently, such brutal behaviour is all too common in Iraq. But it is carried out not by the Allied troops attempting to bring peace and stability to the country, but by the terrorists seeking to undermine those efforts.

By parroting such propaganda Miss Gaiawyn commits a vile calumny against thousands of brave men and women in the UK and allied forces who risk their lives every day to improve life for ordinary Iraqis.

Miss Gaiawyn is one of a group of comfortably-off Western tourists who gain vicarious titillation by visiting the world's trouble spots. They invariably do more harm than good.

The fact that she decided that slap bang in the middle of a war zone was the perfect spot to practise her conjuring tricks - very nearly getting herself killed as a result - says all you need to know about this silly and grossly irresponsible young woman.

After she last appeared in the Craven Herald I exchanged correspondence with her, during which she offered to put me in touch with the International Solidarity Movement - a notorious pro-terrorist group that supports the Palestinian 'armed resistance' - in other words the murder of innocent civilians purely because they happen to be Jewish.

So much for her being a 'peace campaigner'!

William Carmichael,

West Bank Road, Skipton.

SIR - On Sunday leaflets promoting the interests of the British National Party were pushed through our letter box. I read the leaflets during the ads, punctuating the first instalment of a Channel 4 programme, The Children of Abraham, in which a Christian journalist, with the utmost sensitivity and knowledge, was exploring the common heritage of Christians, Jews and Muslims.

The contrast of what I read with what I saw and heard could not have been more striking.

First, the leaflets, one entitled The Dales Patriot and another, an Open Letter to Britain's Muslims, are full of half truths, cleverly worded so as to silence the mind and stir up one's deepest fears and prejudices. Yes, I agree that the growth of Muslim fundamentalism is a matter of grave concern, but what about the malign influence of right-wing Jewish and Christian fundamentalism on our Western leaders?

The BNP leaflets paint a rosy picture of the so-called Britishness the BNP wants to preserve.

I agree that the Koran (which I've read through several times in three different translations), being an 'Old Testament' type of Scripture, is predominantly hostile to both Christianity and Judaism. Moderate Muslims, however, major on the texts both in the Koran and in the Hadith sayings which are more generous to non-Muslims.

During the Middle Ages, there were areas in Spain and some parts of the Middle East where Muslim and Christian lived harmoniously side by side. At this time, Muslim thinking and discoveries enriched Western Christian culture. The way out of our current religious dilemma is to continue and extend the peaceful, informed dialogue in which many of the churches and the mosques are now engaged.

Skiptonians ought to be proud of the high degree of racial harmony which exists in the town. I am hopeful that in the event of more Asians seeking to live in the Dales, the existing residents will follow the example of the people of Skipton. That, I feel, would be the way of true Dales patriotism.

There are plenty of examples of thuggery, burglary and vandalism occurring in the Dales which we at least cannot blame on Muslims. Who were the people who beat up the Asian taxi driver in Settle some months ago? They were not Muslim.

I still have the photo, cut out of the Herald, showing the non-Asian taxi drivers who rallied round to help their Asian colleague.

Who are the vandals who regularly set fire to the charity waste paper collection in Settle Swimming Pool car park? Are they Muslims? If so, they travel a long way to do the damage.

In the BNP literature, I note the choice of writers who have given advance warning of the 'Asian menace'. Rudyard Kipling, a Victorian product of the British Raj, (some of whose writings I enjoy), earns the criticism of the Encyclopedia Britannica for the excessive and damaging jingoistic and imperialist stance he took in some of his writings.

The BNP for obvious reasons, look on him as one guru. The other is Enoch Powell. The BNP seem to have forgotten that before his "rivers of blood" speech, Enoch Powell, was a minister in a Government which brought in, perfectly legally, thousands of British citizens from our former colonies to work in the mills and they were not displacing the native British either.

As for the new houses being pushed up wherever there is space on the edge of the Dales National Park, no one has campaigned more than I against the insensitive way this has been done in the past. I would have more sympathy however, for the BNP if they had pointed out that what we need desperately is more affordable housing for our young people, to keep our little schools and to maintain the balanced character of our rural communities.

I don't think I would qualify as a good BNP member. I am not English. My father was Welsh, my mother a Scot and Canada was my place of birth. A saving grace is that I'm married to a Yorkshireman, but on digging into his family roots, we find they are not impeccably English either. They could be Welsh or, horror of horrors, German.

Kathleen Kinder,

Station Road, Giggleswick,

SIR - What a succinct and accurate comment from David Shaw on the verbage contained in the Craven Community Strategy document.

May I suggest that, once the author has followed up Mr Shaw's recommendation to refer to Fowler and/or Partridge, he or she may feel equipped to reply through your columns with a plain English version of the "key themes" example given in his letter.

Let us hope that the annual reports may benefit from an injection of plain English so that we can understand whether any progress is being made.

Peter Wilson,

Leys Close, Carleton.

SIR - In answer to C Burton's letter (Craven Herald April 16) I can only speak for myself as a responsible dog owner with three dogs.

May I say I have been picking up my pets' dog dirt for at least 30 years. I do not like standing in the offending mess and take it home to dispose of correctly.

I get just as annoyed as Mr Burton but why should the responsible dog owners be lumped together with irresponsible ones and be prevented from enjoying a walk on the canal or in the parks. A similar situation occurs with unruly children, again who are in a minority, but parents are not subjected to being classed as all bad.

The dog wardens in Cross Hills are never around when some of the people who do offend are about, which is really early in the morning in many cases.

Alison Kinglis

Elmore Terrace, Cross Hills.

SIR - I am disabled and was very upset at being excluded from a recent Skipton Town Council meeting. As a wheelchair user, I had wanted to hear the discussions at the recent meeting on public amenities scheduled for Monday evening and express my views concerning wheelchair access to the Gulley area near Moorview Close.

I was most distressed and upset to find I was excluded because there was no wheelchair lift up to the council chambers in the town hall where the meeting was being held. The policy of holding public meetings in rooms without disabled access clearly discriminates against, and indeed, disenfranchises a minority sector of the community whose views need to be known.

The town council has acted undemocratically and I call upon them to address this issue when planning public meetings in the future.

AP Witten,

Moorview Way, Skipton.

SIR - I refer to the item in the Craven Herald (April 23) relating to the house on The Butts under the heading "Size matters".

Whilst some of the old back-to-back dwellings which still exist may be less commodious than the subject of the article, this house is indeed the smallest through dwelling now to be found in Barnoldswick.

With reference to the plaque above the door, I am at a loss to know who in the Barnoldswick History Society professed ignorance about this sign, since it was actually the society that, some years ago, was responsible for initiating the idea that various premises throughout the town should be noted in this manner.

The suggestion was supported by the town council, which asked the society to list a number of premises where plaques could be placed.

This the society did, also supplying the historical notes which formed the basis for the inscriptions. From that point onwards, the town council took responsibility for the preparation and funding of almost 20 such signs, the first of which was placed outside the Greyhound Inn, the 'Dog', some five or six years ago.

So, to your readers, whether local or from farther afield, spend a little time walking around this historical town to see how many such plaques you can find.

Dennis Cairns.

Chairman,

Barnoldswick History Society.

SIR - A movement of road traffic is discernible from the north of Bradford to the south, as evidenced by heavily congested roads along Canal Road and Shipley Airedale Road, which crosses the city of Bradford and then proceeds south along Wakefield and Manchester Roads and on to the motorway.

Despite these identifiable traffic flows, Bradford Council and Bradford Regeneration maintain that there is insufficient movement of traffic from north to south to justify building a cross-city rail link across Bradford, which would connect the two separate rail networks, to the north and south of the city.

Bradford Rail User Group (BRUG) has been actively campaigning for a cross-city rail link, which would allow continuous journeys from, for example, Skipton to Halifax, Huddersfield and Manchester, without changing trains at Leeds, or walking from one Bradford station to the other, in order to continue the journey.

A re-opened Spen Valley line would allow continuous journeys from Skipton to Wakefield and Sheffield.This would help to reduce congestion along the Aire Valley and on the motorway network.

It is clear that a rail link across Bradford would encourage motorists to use alternative modes of travel to the car, and would help to reduce road congestion and pollution.

The electrification of the Aire and Wharfedale lines, together with the introduction of class 333 trains, has given rise to increased patronage of ten per cent per annum for the last ten years. There is no doubt that Bradford Cross-rail would enjoy similar success.

It would be interesting to learn of the travel habits of your readers, who need to travel from north to south. Those who are prepared to furnish me with their travel details may contact me by email:

asuchi@aol.com or via: Lloyd and Robinson Opticians, 64 Westgate, Bradford, BD1 2QR.

Alec Suchi

Secretary

Bradford Rail User Group

Allerton Road, Bradford.