Letters - July 11, 2018

I see the deputy leader of Blackpool Council has finally woken up to the fact we have a real problem with rough sleepers and aggressive beggars in the town.

Unfortunately Coun Gillian Campbell’s actions come several years too late to change the minds of the many visitors and residents who have stopped coming to Blackpool because of the state of our shopping areas which have been blighted by these unacceptable anti-social individuals.

Despite many letters to the Gazette and other media from concerned residents and business owners concerning vagrants, beggars and drug zombies, this council has done nothing at all. Perhaps the fact that the local elections are taking place next May has helped Coun Campbell to re-visit what should have been addressed a long time ago, or is it that she knows that the Blackpool Conservative Group are promising ‘zero tolerance’ in our manifesto and we mean it - from day one.

Coun Tony Williams

Conservative Group Leader
 Blackpool Council

UTILITIES

We want our 
water back!

I keep getting emails from United Utilities asking me to save water.

Is it some sort of joke... the way this lot have treated us?

The water industry must be returned to public ownership, with no compensation for the parasites who have profited from people’s most essential needs.

Water belongs to us all in the first place and should never have been privatised.

Some 83 per cent of us want our water back now.

If anything the water companies should be compensating us, the public, for their astonishingly bad record over 30 years.

They have a mountain of debt and get profits of £1.8bn a year from us. They must also be made to compensate us for damage done to our rivers and wildlife.

Ownership of water supplies was stolen from the people and privatised by Thatcher in 1989 making our most vital utility a source of private profit.

When it was run by local authorities some 45 years ago, in my first house my rates bill had a bit on the bottom for water - it was pence.

Fat cat bosses of nine English regional water companies, have lined their own pockets, while up to 30 per cent of treated water supplies are lost through leaks with nothing spent on repair and a general lack of investment.

We need to turn off the tap of excessive pay awards to water bosses and put our interest first.

Water is essential for the maintenance of life and never should be used for private profit.

ROYSTON JONES

Anchorsolme

POLITICS

Why not protest dictators too?

It is reported that such are the numbers of the large crowds of people being assembled to object to President Trump during his visit to Britain, that his route is being revised to keep him largely away from the capital.

This is the properly-elected leader of the United States, Britain’s best friend which came to our aid in two world wars and has since protected the peace in Europe.

As such he is entitled to a polite and proper welcome – even from those who disagree with his politics.

Odd how the left hates our friends and loves our enemies. I cannot recall any major protest movement when Robert Mugabe (to name only one of several murderous dictators) came to Britain.

Arthur Quarmby

via email

* I don’t like Trump and am baffled how such a buffoon came to power.

He appears to court controversy among all and sundry and so how can he expect there not to be protests?

But why only Trump?

There are too many countries with human, animal and environmental rights abuses.

Some even worse then the USA! Is the anti-Trump protest a sign of a new movement emerging where people will campaign against wrongdoings wherever they occur?

Or is this just a one-off bandwagon, targeting one man and country, and once the visit is over, the campaigners will jump off the wagon until the next ‘trendy’ protest comes along?

I hope the former, but sadly I suspect the latter.

Voice of Reason

Via email