Letters to the Editor

SIR - Does the Government think a possible eight-minute reduction in the time it takes to clear the M606/M62 East junction is really going to persuade more people to car-share?

As someone who has car-shared in the past, I know that the time it takes to make the detour to pick someone up, and wait outside their house for them to be ready, will take all of the eight minutes it is supposed to save.

Spending £2.5 million to allow only 16 per cent of the existing traffic to use the new lanes does not make sense for the economy or the environment.

If there is to be a short cut on the junction, why not make it available to other vehicles as well, especially HGVs? These are the vehicles which will cause the most pollution by being stuck in stationary traffic and possibly help to contribute more to the delays as they require the most space and time, due to size and lower rate of acceleration, to negotiate the existing junction.

The best way must be to build a filter lane which takes all vehicles away from the traffic lights and provides a smooth-flowing lane on to the M62 East.

Ian Peckett, Olive Walk, Harrogate.

Carnegie solution

SIR - What to do with the now-empty Carnegie Library at the bottom of Carr Lane, Shipley? asks Mike Priestley in his North of Watford column (T&A, March 11).

It certainly does look foreign and isolated at this busy junction.

Apart from a safety aspect, would there be any real benefit in improving traffic flow for it to arrive more quickly at the heavily-congested Fox Corner and Saltaire Road junction?

The library could be relocated on to the vacant land adjacent to Carnegie Drive, with the attractive parade being incorporated into a new building creating a facility that could be used by many organisations in the locality.

R J Lacey, Wrose Road, Shipley.

Undeniable fact

SIR - In reply to David Rhodes (T&A, March 15) who wrongly claims global warming is down to Mother Nature, global warming is widely recognised by the scientific community to be an undeniable fact.

For example, the CO2 atmospheric concentrations since the pre-industrial era has increased from 280 to more than 370 parts per million by volume. To put that in context, over the last ice age the concentration of CO2 rose from 200 to 280 ppmv.

In short, the CO2 concentrations in our atmosphere have increased by 160 billion tonnes over the last 100 years, a change which took Mother Nature thousands of years to bring about.

Moreover, leaked reports from the conservative Independent Panel of Climate Change, set up by the United Nations to give governments independent advice on climate change, claim the anticipated doubling of CO2 emissions is likely to cause a temperature rise between two to four and a half degrees Celsius. This would have severe consequences, such as the collapse of the Greenland ice sheet and disruption of the Gulf Stream ocean current.

The question is not 'Is climate change happening or not'?, but rather 'What are we going to do about it'?

David Lawson, Altar Drive, Heaton.

Extra demands

SIR - David Rhodes is right up to a point (T&A, March 15) when he asserts there have always been natural variations in the world's climate because of changes in solar output, sunspots, and the path round the sun, as well as dust from volcanoes, meteorites and land mass changes.

Four ice ages in the last million years, the medieval warm period and the cold years a couple of centuries ago when the Thames froze are all evidence.

However, there are now two significant differences which mean the above are not a sufficient explanation of what is happening.

When I was born there were fewer than two billion humans making demands on the planet. Now the figure is six and a half billion, and rising by 100 million a year.

Secondly for the first time in the earth's history we now import CO2 from previous geological periods, in the form of oil, gas and coal. The level is increasing rapidly in the atmosphere and is now higher than it has been in the last ten million years.

Mother Nature has an enormous number of unruly children and we are making our home very uncomfortable for the future.

Keith Thomson, Heights Lane, Bradford.

Reward for failure

SIR - I'm sure I speak for many hard-working NHS staff when I say how disgusted I am by the double standards adopted by the government.

I refer to the resignation/early retirement of Sir Nigel Crisp, chief executive at the Department of Health and NHS.

At a time when regular employees are fighting their corner to avoid having to work until the age of 65, only to retire on miserable pensions, their lives blighted by the fatigue of shift work and night duty, he is calling it a day at 54.

He is alleged to be going because of the debts chalked up by so many NHS Trusts (my own included). This sounds to me like a reward for failure.

As a staff nurse, I am lucky to get a reward for success. Failure would no doubt see me clearing my locker and trying to hang on to my registration.

Is it right Sir Nigel should be retiring on a pension of £100,000 per year while the rest of us, who hold the NHS together, struggle on to pay our ever-increasing bills and hope to live long enough to make it to retirement?

Mrs Cathy MacKay, Bailey Hills Road, Bingley.

The Iraq myths

SIR - The invasion of Iraq by US forces in April 2003 was supposed to bring freedom and a new way of life for the Iraqi people.

If Mr Bush truly believed that, he was living in cloud cuckoo land as most politicians do.

The promised new life of hope and prosperity for the people of Iraq has turned into what we see on a daily basis - a living hell of hostage-taking, murders, car bombs and bodies strewn around the streets of Baghdad.

Iraq has become the most hate-fuelled and deadliest place on earth.

After all this Mr Bush and Mr Blair keep insisting they have achieved a worthwhile, just cause with the notion that Iraq will come out of this war smelling of roses and live happily ever after in prosperity.

R Halliday, Crag Road, Shipley.

'No' to Leeds...

SIR - Does a city the size of Bradford want to become a part of 'Leeds City Region' and be seen as the equivalent of Oldham, Rochdale, Bury, Stockport or Bolton together with Salford making up Greater Manchester?

Leeds is not Manchester, and with a population larger than Kingston-upon-Hull we have never had that kind of relationship with Leeds.

Do we want it or is it necessary?

Despite all its faults I identify strongly with Bradford, no matter how successful Leeds is.

I do not want to be told I live in the 'Leeds City Region' in the future, especially since I have never felt like singing 'Marching on Together' at Elland Road.

Iain Morris, Caroline Street, Saltaire.

A panto treat

SIR - I just wanted to say how much my grand-daughter and I enjoyed Goldilocks and the Three Bears at Bingley Arts Centre.

The singing, dancing, comedy and costumes were great.

Long live panto!

A Burgess, Beacon Close, Gilstead, Bingley

Effective action

SIR - I see from a letter written by Paul Donnelly (T&A, March 11) that First Bus in Bradford is having trouble enforcing a no-smoking policy on their buses.

Might I suggest the company adopt a technique employed by bus companies in London?

If a passenger starts smoking, the driver stops the bus and refuses to move until either the cigarette is extinguished or the offending passenger gets off the bus, or both.

Very effective.

Kate Alley, Action on Smoking and Health, Clifton Street, London.