Blame parents for school vandalism

SIR - Re reports in the T&A about Eccleshill School being vandalised by children.

I have watched children as young as four years old vandalising empty houses. Over the bank holiday we have seen youths and children breaking empty house windows, pulling the contents out and throwing them into the back garden. On the Monday morning we noticed that one of the houses had been set on fire overnight.

The workmen come and board the houses up but the children just pull the tin shutters off again and think they have a right to play in these empty houses.

Where are the parents? Don't they care about their children? If one of these children gets hurt or burnt, who'll be blamed? The Council, of course, for leaving the houses empty so that the child can get in. But it really it is the parents' fault for not keeping their offspring under control.

This is why we have to have police patrolling the upper school over the bank holiday. If the Council evicted the families causing the damage to the school and their properties, this might teach other parents to look after their children.

Mrs L E Jowett, Norbury Road, Ravenscliffe, Bradford.

Slavery jobs?

SIR - Re the letter from Councillor Thorne (April 10). The "fact" of one million more people being employed under Labour counts for next to nothing.

What jobs are they in? Are they long term? Are they well paid? Or are these people just being kicked off benefits and into slavery jobs like cleaning, exploited to the bone?

The "minimum wage" which is totally disregarded by many businesses, counts for little in many parts of Britain due to inexplicably rocketing council tax etc.

Let's not also forget the 75p "hike" in pensions, Hatfield, Paddington and the flu epidemic.

Let's face it, NHS spending and pay for nurses etc couldn't really get lower, education spending is unchanged in real terms and even Jack Straw admitted that police numbers were down.

Tax cuts by the Tories won't help, but neither will election bribes for the middle classes from Messrs Blair and Brown.

No capitalist party can provide essential public services to an adequate degree of quality - neither the old Tories, or the New ones.

C Spurgin, Dorset Street, Skipton.

Foolish things

SIR - E Redman (T&A, April 18) looks back with nostalgia to the days when 16 ounces made one pound, unless they were fluid ounces, in which case 20 of them made one pint, except in America where only 16 were necessary; the days when water froze at 32 degrees and boiled at 212; school children chanted about 12 inches in one foot, three feet in one yard, and 1,760 yards in one mile, and also of rods, poles, perches, chains and furlongs. There were 240 pennies in a pound, but only 20 shillings.

What other foolish things can we cling to, like a drowning person clutching a lead weight (avoirdupois of course)?

Fortunately we of the "imperial" generations are dying out, some of us complaining to the last gasp of a logical system where everything divides by tens and hundreds. Younger people know only the clear logic of decimals and metric measure.

Onward and upward!

L Hobsbaum, Willow Crescent, Bradford 2.

Running away

SIR - Correct me if I am wrong, but Tony Blair never said he was going to go to the country on May 3, nor has he said he will go on June 7.

The Conservatives were accused of wanting a delay in any general election because it would be in their political interest.

Am I being nave in believing that, if the PM is to hold the election on June 7, political matters will have no influence on his decision?

After all if New Labour is working, why should he take the risk - no matter how small - of depriving us of another year of his and his party's brilliance? What is he running away from? Is he privy to some information that we are not?

Perhaps the clouds on the economic horizon will see the bubble burst. I hope we don't, but we might see unemployment, inflation and interest rates rising again.

He wants a chance to be re-elected before the rot sets in and if it does and he is re-elected, we shall then see if he and his hangers-on can cope.

P E Bird, Nab Wood Terrace, Shipley.

What culture?

SIR - How can Bradford, a city that has become quite hideous, purport to be European City of Culture?

So many of its citizens are anything but cultured, and so much of its culture is anything but European.

Iain Morris, Caroline Street, Saltaire.

Brighten things up

SIR - It has to be said that there has been a remarkable improvement to Bradford Interchange. However, I feel there is still room for more.

Other stations around the county have electronic arrivals/departure boards. This saves the passenger from running around the station.

Also it is annoying when you are going for a bus and the doors will not open. The driver meanwhile sits in his cab watching lots of passengers frantically trying to get out of the station!

Finally, now we have a new station what about brightening the caf up? A bit of jolly colour is needed to stop it looking so drab!

S J Myers, Paternoster Lane, Great Horton.

No solution

SIR - If central heating and double glazing are more important to some tenants than security of tenure and affordable rents, why don't they just give notice to the Council and get on a housing association list?

It's not much use having central heating if you can no longer afford to keep the roof over your head because of the substantially higher rents you will pay to the new landlords, not to mention the cost-reflective increases to be paid for any improvements.

My thanks to Odsal tenants for the invitation to their meeting, but as for living in cloud-cuckoo land - that's for those who think privatisation will solve their problems.

V Rose (Defend Council Housing Campaign Bradford South), Reevy Road West, Buttershaw.

Lovely picture

SIR - Thank you for printing a lovely picture of our new church banner in last Thursday's T&A. The nicest aspect is that it is a joint piece of work between St Matthew's Church of England congregation and St Monica's Roman Catholic congregation who worship in the same building.

A second banner to hang beside it, headed St Monica's, is already at the design stage.

John F Hansen, Manor House Road, Wilsden.