Letters to the Editor

SIR:- Following the latest raid on my shop I was contacted by Kate Brown from the parish council who, I am delighted to say, has advised me that the council is now willing to consider an open form of external shuttering to protect business premises in Ilkley.

This, I am sure, will do more to keep Ilkley an attractive town to which people will want to come to than empty and boarded-up premises. Also I was very pleased to read the report concerning Councillor Lexa Robinson's support for the protection of businesses within Ilkley which in view of, I will now continue operating Xqisit in Ilkley.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank my customers, neighbours and fellow business owners for their messages of goodwill and support during what has been a very trying time for me.

It is actions like these that restore my faith in the human race and makes me determined that good will overcome evil. As you will be aware, another raid was made on Boots recently.

As, despite the crimes occurring in Ilkley, we are still left without adequate policing, this must surely be addressed by the new divisional commander, Sarah Sidney, as we now need actions not words, or Ilkley will become another town full of charity and low value goods shops.

Cherrie Armstrong

Xqisit,

Leeds Road,

Ilkley.

Electric event

SIR, - It may have been cold, wet and very windy but the atmosphere was electric.

I must congratulate Clevedon House School for the absolutely brilliant hockey tournament they staged on Sunday. The standard of hockey played and the sportsmanship of all the players was excellent, in spite of the unfavourable weather.

Clevedon House School is rapidly gaining a reputation in the Wharfe Valley for being able to organise large sporting events and I congratulate all who were involved.

Mrs G AKESTER

(Parent),

19 Bracken Park,

Bingley.

Police precept

SIR, - New research published this week shows that the police authority levy on West Yorkshire's Council Tax bills has soared by 92 per cent under Labour. This year, the police precept is forecast to be £102 on band D bills, compared to £53 in 1997, an increase of £49 a year.

We already knew that Labour's fiddled funding has forced local councils to increase Council Tax bills to prevent cuts in frontline services. Now we can see that the police are not immune either. The police levy on Council Tax bills has gone up by five times the rate of inflation since 1997. Extra cost pressures, new burdens and red-tape have forced up policing costs, but with local taxpayers are being made to foot the bill.

But a fairer funding deal for West Yorkshire is only one part of the necessary solution. People are also concerned that the police are not always able to devote as much attention as they would wish to local priorities, because they have to put the Government's imposed national targets first. These can take a disproportionate amount of time and funding, to the detriment of local priorities. More and more low-level crime and disorder is unreported and wrongly tolerated.

Greater accountability - through the form of elected police authorities - would help make sure that the money raised locally is spent on tackling the crime concerns of local people in the Keighley constituency.

Robert Collinson

Prospective Parliamentary

Conservative Candidate

for Keighley.

Proved right

SIR, - The photograph above your report of a proposed conversion of a Ben Rhydding factory to apartments last week is not dissimilar to the one which appeared on page 7 of your issue of September 25, 1997.

The report which accompanied that photograph predicted problems for residents following refusal of the 1997 planning application to convert from light industrial to residential use. How true that prediction has turned out to be! The various planning refusals over the years, for conversion to residential use, have put great emphasis on the poor access to the site along the back lane. But this does not seem to prevent vans of up to 7.5 tonnes driving/reversing up and down the lane on a daily basis.

Their manoeuvres are regularly accompanied by reversing alarms, vibration of our house windows, and occasional minor collisions with our garage. What is worse, for a period between one and two years ago, 44-tonne six-axle articulated semi-trailers were regular visitors to the lane.

These caused severe damage to the surface, plus major obstruction for those attempting to access their garages, or even to pass along the lane on foot. On the worst occasion the lane was blocked continuously for more than five hours.

It is difficult to comprehend the logic which says that a few extra car movements associated with residential use are going to be a problem, but very large vehicles associated with light industrial use are quite acceptable.

Ian Henderson

3 Wheatley Avenue,

Ben Rhydding.

Veggie vote

SIR, - As part of its annual Veggie Month, Animal Aid is holding a light-hearted poll throughout March to find out 'who is the greatest vegetarian ever?'.

We invite you - vegetarians and non-vegetarians alike - to choose between 12 famous men and women whose belief in a non-meat diet was integral to their great achievements in life. Our 'finalists' range from historical figures such as Gandhi, Leonardo da Vinci (who, way back in the 15th century, expressed a belief 'the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men') and Albert Einstein, through to more modern icons, Spike Milligan, Martina Navratilova and rock musician, Moby.

If you would like to vote - or would just like to receive more information about either the poll or a non-meat diet - please check out our website at www.animalaid.co.uk/vegpoll or telephone (01732) 354032.

Ajaye Curry

Campaigns Officer,

Animal Aid,

Bradford Street,

Tonbridge, Kent.

Ilkley councillor challenges MPs

SIR, - There are two million electors at present involved with the Equitable Life pension scheme and the Penrose Report.

These electors invested in good faith with a reasonable expectation that their investment would hold a safeguard to their retirement.

They also felt they had good protection from the regulatory bodies. They have been let down by both and are being abandoned to their fate by this Government.

To quote Labour MP George Mudie: "Gordon Brown says I do not want you to be dependent on the state pension - so I want you to put money aside. You can do it over 30 years or 40 years."

I'm painting a picture of the person who's done what the Government wants them to do - and in the light of the Penrose Report, Ministers are saying: "We are in the clear, you're on your own brothers and sisters." It strikes me as callous.

I challenge the local Labour MPs, Ann Cryer and Chris Leslie, to follow suit with similar condemnation.

Anne Hawkesworth

Ilkley Conservative

District and Parish

Councillor,

29 Manley Road,

Ben Rhydding.

Keighley and Ilkley MP responds

SIR, - Coun Hawkesworth displays her true colours from the very start of her letter. By referring to 'electors', Coun Hawkesworth confirms my suspicion that the Conservative Party will sink to any level in an attempt to carry political and electoral advantage amidst personal misery.

I would prefer to see those people who have lost out at the hands of Equitable Life as people, with real lives and families, as opposed to 'electors'. But in her haste to secure a perceived political advantage, Coun Hawkesworth failed to pass even a cursory glance on the facts.

She fails to point out that Lord Penrose pointed out that senior regulatory officers urged him 'to take account the political climate that prevailed for most of the 1990's when the Government's objective was to deregulate, to reduce regulator burdens on business, to avoid interference in private companies, and to let market forces prevail."

Coun Hawkesworth neglects to mention that it was the Labour Government which, in 1997, introduced an effective regulatory system including the creation of a Financial Services Compensation Scheme and a single financial Ombudsman service. Lord Penrose endorsed the Government's actions since coming to power.

Had Coun Hawkesworth bothered to read the Penrose Report (I will gladly send her a copy) she would have seen that he concluded that 'the society was the author of its own misfortunes.' Is she advocating that the Government steps in and compensates all those people who have lost at the hands of maladministration on the part of a private firm?

Whilst I welcome Coun Hawkesworth's conversion from the principles of laissez faire to a planned economy, I fear that she has given no consideration to the repercussions of her argument. Which budget should she prefer to cut so as to compensate the Equitable Life investors. Health? Education? Police?

Or is the Conservative Party now advocating tax increases? And where would the case for compensation end? Should the Government compensate people for the fluctuations in the values of stocks and shares? I do not recall the last Tory Government rushing to compensate home owners for the negative equity in their homes when interest rates reached 15 per cent.

Surprisingly, given Coun Hawkesworth's new found interest in pensions, is the fact that the Tories tabled an amendment to the new Pensions Bill - which aims to set up a pension protection fund that will help more than ten million people in the future - that begins: "This House declines to give a Second Reading to the Pensions Bill".

Coun Hawkesworth's comments represent no more than a shameful attempt to exploit personal misery for political advantage. I had hoped that the Tories had learned the lesson that, to be a credible opposition, they needed to ditch the band-wagon (however flawed) and adopt some principles.

ANN CRYER

MP for Keighley

Constituency.