Letters - Tuesday, October 20, 2020

Some MPs tell us they will give their salary increase to charity or not accept it - well bully for them!

Taxpayers are subsidising the food and drink of politicians in both houses of parliament to the tune of some £57,000 a week.

The Peers Dining Room in the house of Lords was alone given £779,297 of our cash last year while a subsidy of £646,000 allowed Parliament’s Terrace Cafeteria to serve portions of soup for £1,01, roast turkey for £3.19, and strawberry sponge at £1.12. Drinks in their own saloon cost just £3.60 for a pint of lager, while a bitter is a mere £2.60, courtesy of our public purse.

But Boris Johnson has rejected Marcus Rashfords’ campaign for free school meals for poor children over the half-term break on the grounds that, “it is not for schools to provide food for pupils during school holidays”.

Royston Jones

Anchorsholme

Immigration

Don’t be gullible. Are they genuine?

Re: Callous idea for asylum seekers (Your Say, October 15). I wish Mr Prance would give it a rest. As far as his view on “asylum seekers” is concerned, he is being a bit gullible.

How do we know they are all what they claim to be rather than actually only wanting this country to give them everything for free?

Yes, Australia has adopted the strategy of transporting them to an island off their coast, and low and behold their immigration has dropped to one per cent of what it used to be.

The island is still under the Australian Government’s control and it is supported by them.

If I were a genuine asylum seeker, don’t you think I would prefer this option to being dead?

So this leads me to believe that the majority were not in fear of their lives at all.

Also this might be interesting for readers.

I watched a quiz show recently and one of the questions was “Name a country with a lower population than the UK”.

This may be hard to believe but Australia and Canada have fewer people than we have in this country.

Another interesting fact is that France is about four times the size of the UK but has the same amount of population.

It is because of Labour’s ‘open door’ policy that this country’s support services have been struggling, with the health services, schools, housing and the benefits system all under pressure.

Another question for Mr Prance.

Did you send in letters when Tony Blair and Gordon Brown made a pig’s ear of it when they were in power?

They in fact sold off the portion of the nationalised companies of which Margaret Thatcher had kept a controlling percentage and Gordon Brown sold off our gold reserves at a fraction of their worth.

Not to mention taking us into a war we shouldn’t have been in.

We have too many ‘do- gooders’ and ‘tree-huggers’ in this country.

It is about time this paper publishes letters of all different views, not just the Labour supporters.

So come on you people, let’s have letters with a more diverse view.

Y W

via email

Virus

Why have none been prosecuted?

Is it any wonder that trust and respect in our politicians have sunk to a new low?

As far as Covid is concerned, you can trace the disgust of people going right back to the Cummings affair when Boris refused to sack him.

And then there was the Robert Jenrick (housing minister) episode when he did a 40-mile trip (under lockdown) to supposedly deliver his mother’s medicine.

Then we had the after 10pm drinking in the parliamentary bars.

But the prize must go to the bare-faced cheek of Scottish MP Margaret Ferrier refusing to resign. She tested positive for Covid then gave a speech in Parliament before jumping on a train back to Scotland.

This is the lady, at the time of the Dominic Cummings episode, who gave a speech in Parliament and publicly berated him for what he did.

The question that hangs in the air is why have none of these people ever been prosecuted?

M Tipper

address supplied