Letters - Tuesday, March 24, 2020

For the past four years or so I have placed an on line order with Asda twice weekly for food.

This week everything fell apart.

I manage a nursing home with up to 30 elderly residents. I have to feed them come what may, yet I have been humiliated at checkouts with food being taken off me.

I usually spend about £400 per week with the supermarket but on Friday I was limited to one bottle of milk and one loaf.

I am not stockpiling for myself but trying to keep people alive. Despite pleas to the staff I was turned down and left with my meagre rations.

Tesco was pretty much the same. I spent the whole of Friday morning going around shops to get enough dairy, bread and eggs to last the weekend.

Why can’t the supermarket bosses make care homes a special case? We are looking after other people’s mums and dads and we need that extra bit of help.

It’s soul destroying, time consuming and annoying to see the shelves bear and all I can buy is enough to care for a family for one day.

My staff work 12 hours shifts in a difficult job and they are finding it hard to shop now that supermarkets are on reduced hours and by the time they can get to the shops there is nothing left. All I am asking for is bread, milk and eggs. Some flour to bake with and consideration from the big guys that are doing little to help.

It certainly makes you think where your loyalties will lie after the COVID 19 situation is over.

Marion Gourlay

via email

VIRUS

Thank goodness Corbyn isn’t PM now

The government’s bail out for redundant workers is one of the most generous in the western world.

It will save hundreds of thousands of jobs.

The plan has rightly been applauded except by Labour. Its response has been pathetic.

Unlike Chancellor Sunak whose economic knowledge is impeccable, John McDonnell has floundered. His response has been amateurish and churlish.

We are living in war time conditions, in some respects even more hazardous. Thank goodness the hand on the tiller is not Corbyn or any of his cronies.

Dr Barry Clayton

Thornton Cleveleys

VIRUS

Boris a buffoon not sorting panic buying

Why has this useless government not banned panic buying?

The supermarkets are still allowing people to over-buy vital products. I called Johnson a ‘buffoon’ from day one and I have been proved right!

Alan Lowe

Fairhaven

VIRUS

Don’t be ungrateful

Over the weekend, I overheard two ladies chatting in my local supermarket.

They were complaining most bitterly about the amount of financial money the Government was prepared to award them as they had both lost their jobs as a result of shop closures due to the current viral epidemic.

Upon arriving home, my son rang from Bangkok where he has worked for the past 12 years as a self-employed electrician.

His call reminded me just what a global issue this is as his local mall has closed where he was due to start a job this week and other sites where he was due to work have also shut down.

He now has no income and has to live on his limited savings.There is no such thing as a welfare benefit system in Thailand nor indeed a NHS service as we know it and rely upon.

The point I would make to these two ungrateful ladies is that they should feel eternally grateful that they live in our country where residents do receive financial support from the Government in a crisis. Others around the world, not simply in Thailand, are not so fortunate!

Jim Oldcorn

Great Harwood

EVENTS

Regret as town’s

festival cancelled

It is with regret that we have to announce the cancellation of the 2020 Garstang and District Children’s Festival.

Based upon Government advice regarding public gatherings, together with restrictions being implemented by Wyre Council, it will be impossible for the festival to take place on the usual May Spring Bank Holiday. As the current restrictions are projected to be in place for some time, there does not seem to be any obvious future date that we could realistically plan for this year. Next year’s 2021 Children’s Festival will also be the 150th anniversary of the event and, with this in mind, we intend to make it a really special occasion – not only for the children but also for everyone in the Garstang area and hope that it will be something for us all to look forward to.

David Lewis

Festival secretary