DCSIMG

May 18: Unfinished homes must be used first


Published on Friday 15 May 2009 10:54

I've just read the WNDC housing consultation and it seems to me that the whole consultation process is a sham, so that when the majority wake up to what is happening (when it is too late) the WNDC and local authorities will be able to tell us that it constituted a representation of public choice.

The term 'affordable housing' in my opinion is also a sham designed to get the public to accept the destruction of their environment with house-building, by getting them to believe that their children may be in with a chance of local accommodation.

There are presently many building projects around the outskirts of Northampton that contain a lot of unsold and unfinished affordable housing, so I wonder why we need to ruin more of the environment and destroy more farmland by building more houses.

One example is the proposal to build more than 100 houses in Bugbrooke when buildings lay unfinished, empty and unsold just four miles away at Upton.

The whole problem of housing needs to be tackled from other angles and needs to be thought through on a longer-term basis.

For example, methods of controlling UK population without restricting individual freedom.

Constant expansion has occurred during my lifetime and it's obviously unsustainable in the long term due to environmental damage and reduction of farmland which will reduce the quality of everyone's life.

I don't understand why the advocates of the constant desire for expansion and building on farmland don't seem to realise that we are metaphorically shooting ourselves in the foot as there is no doubt to me that this land will, one day in the future, be crucially needed for the production of food.

They are blinded as to the long-term consequences of their actions by greed and the quest for profit over the wider social good.

Shaun Walton,

Smitherway,

Bugbrooke.

16,000 Gurkhas may settle in UK

MR Wright (Viewpoint, May) again misrepresents the policy of the Government towards the Gurkhas.

In my previous letter I said this Government was the first to grant the right to Gurkhas for permanent settlement in our country and 6,000 Gurkhas and their families have been given that right since 2004.

On April 24, the Government announced an improved policy for those Gurkhas who retired before July 1997.

If a Gurkha meets one, and only one, of the following five criteria, then they get permanent settlement rights in the UK:

n Three years continuous residence in the UK before or after retirement

n Close family living in the UK

n A level one to three award for gallantry, leadership or bravery (basically awards above Mentioned in Despatches)

n Twenty or more years service (it is estimated that the majority of those qualifying under this criteria will be below commissioned officer rank)

n A chronic long-term medical condition attributable to, or aggravated by, service in the Gurkha Brigade.

When this announcement was made, the campaigners and large sections of the media assumed wrongly that this criteria only applied to the 1,350 outstanding appeal cases (this is where the figure of 100 comes from).

This new criteria applies to all Gurkhas, not just the 1,350, and there are 36,000 living in Nepal.

Of those, 4,300 qualify together with 5,800 family members and our Government is going to be active in Nepal in advising Gurkhas of this new policy.

Should all these Gurkas wish to come to the UK, this will mean a total of 16,000 Gurkhas and families living in our country with the right of permanent residence as compared to zero previously under the Tories.

A further announcement will be made shortly which, I believe, will allow even more Gurkas to come here.

That’s 16,000 Gurkhas and families living in our country, and quite rightly so.

This is not what Mr Wright and others would have your readers believe.

Geoff Howes,

Alliston Gardens,

Northampton.

Cabinet member should resign

I ponder the role of Northamptonshire County Councillor Ben Smith in the council’s core strategy on minerals and waste.

At the council’s cabinet meeting in December, when members of the public and many of his fellow councillors were trying to tell him that several aspects of the core strategy were so much rubbish and should be reconsidered, he moved, as the cabinet member responsible for this strategy, that it should go forward.

This going forward has so far proved an embarrassment to the council, as shown by the letter from Shaun Hope published on May 7.

The compilation of the core strategy, the involvement of consultants and the costs of the independent inquiry have also been a great expense suffered by the public purse.

Should Councillor Smith not think of resigning his position or will he be happy in future to face chants of “rubbish” from his fellow members whenever he speaks in the council chamber?

Malcolm Brice,

Spinney Drive, Collingtree,

Northampton.

Wrong to name and shame

I AM writing in response to your article published on May 5 concerning the sentencing of 21 drug dealers.

I disagree entirely with your decision to print pictures and identifying information. Many of those you exposed have families local to this area whose lives will have already been badly affected by addiction.

The sensationalised naming and shaming process you have indulged in will only expose these family members to further hardship and heartache.

I would also like to point out that “Operation Metro” has required considerable resources from the police, the courts and the probation service and to my knowledge, has not succeeded in arresting and sentencing even one significant drug dealer.

Those pictured in your article are the addicts who will resort to running for the dealers in order to fund their own use.

Inevitably, if such people are approached by someone on the street who pretends to be suffering from withdrawal and is offering an opportunity for quick money to be made just to be connected to a dealer, addicts will respond because they recognise the suffering and need the money to fund their own ongoing use.

To my mind this kind of police operation is no more than entrapment and should not be presented as a glorified success but rather as a waste of time and money because such undercover operations will always fail to target those who truly profit from the addiction of others.

Amber Goldsmith,

Kingsthorpe,

Northampton.

Potholes meant a test failure

While they fail to fix Sandy Lane with its poor road surface and numerous potholes, the reality is that it is costing me time and money.

I recently had the misfortune of failing my driving test due to one thing: not going fast enough on Sandy Lane.

Doing national speed limit along this road could damage my car and potentially cause an accident! 60 mph is not appropriate on this road surface and the fact I was doing 40, should not be a fail.

It’ll be another six weeks before I can sit my test and another 62.50 to do so, knowing if I get this route again the same thing could happen.

This means I have to choose between driving safely, or following the road signs so I don’t see how I can win!

Claire Popely (aged 17),

Friars Avenue,

Delapre, Northampton.


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