January 17, 2007

10:53am Wednesday 17th January 2007

HOME OFFICE

YET again Home Office ministers are under pressure.

The latest issue involves the criminal records of British subjects who have been convicted of crimes abroad, and those crimes going unrecorded in this country.

Even after police chiefs advised the Home Office of the situation the problem was left unresolved, meaning we could have murderers and paedophiles working in our schools.

This situation follows the debacle of five murderers walking out of an open prison, and an inmate at Northallerton Young Offenders' Institution, North Yorkshire, (Echo, Jan 11) being awarded £575,000 after attempting suicide.

These issues were just the latest in a long line of outrages.

Home Secretary John Reid genuinely wants to make an improvement in the Home Office.

However, because political correctness riddles his, and other government departments, he will always be vulnerable.

The Human Rights Act is allowing political correctness, and incompetence, to reach everhigher levels of absurdity. We are in a vicious circle of silliness.

- Councillor Kevin Thompson, Liberal Democrat, Sedgefield Borough Council.

MEET THE NEETS

IN a world of acronyms we now have Neets - Not in Employment, Education or Training.

The number of working age Neets in this country is 5.4 million. The number of 16 to 24- year-olds is 1.4 million.

Each new Neet will cost the country between £97,000 to £300,000 over their lifetime (research by Reform); 60 per cent of Neet females have children by the age of 21 compared with ten per cent of the non-Neet population; and 29 per cent of male Neets and eight per cent of females were involved in crime.

The money needed to fund them comes from welfare. Social Security dependency in 2005-06 was £79bn (excluding pensions), £6bn more than spent on education.

I'm not suggesting a Neet's lifestyle is attractive, but it's a way of life that has been developed to make the best of existing on social welfare.

The work ethic of the 1940s and 50s wasn't perfect, but with it came a sense of pride and respect.

The growth of this generation of Neets and the next generation is the biggest problem this country has faced for a long time. - NL Kellett, near Crook, Co Durham.

TERRORISM

DAVID Lacey (HAS, Jan 11) reasonably draws a distinction between terrorists who deliberately target civilians, and those who kill civilians "accidentally", but the overwhelming and indiscriminate power of the war machines of the state tends to blur the distinction.

Thermobaric weapons, as used by the Americans in Fallujah and by the Russians in Grozny, are described as having the effect of a tactical nuclear weapon without the residual radiation.

Cluster bombs discharge up to 2,000 "bomblets", which are essentially the same as the nowbanned anti-personnel mines, and continue to kill and maim long after the battle is over.

In the recent conflict in Lebanon, Hezbollah, generally labelled terrorists, killed 147 people, mostly Israeli soldiers, while Israel, supposedly acting in self-defence, killed 1,287, mostly civilians.

Such warfare is both immoral and counterproductive, serving only to invigorate the terrorists, and guarantee them a limitless supply of recruits. This "war on terror" will never be won. - Pete Winstanley, Durham.

CAPITALISM

GLOBAL inequality in income may actually be falling, as claimed by Chris White (HAS, Jan 3), but only between workers.

The actual gap between the wealthiest five per cent and the rest of us continues to grow exponentially.

As for "trade and industrialisation" getting "Europe out of poverty 200 years ago", I'm afraid not. Poverty, want, insecurity and lack of access to the necessities of life - medicine, heating, housing and indeed food - are still problematic to tens of millions of people in Europe today, never mind the rest of the world.

The only solution is a world that is the common heritage of us all. A world in which the things we need to live are produced for direct human use, not with the primacy of production for profit.

Finally, Mr White states that capitalism is better than any of the alternatives. However, since capitalism took over dominance globally from feudalism there has never been any alternative.

What you undoubtedly see as communism/socialism is merely state-capitalism, another way of running the world today, in the interests of a few. - Steve Colborn, Seaham, Co Durham.

TALE OF A TAIL

AMONG the list of "vestigial structures" that Chris White cites as "remnants of evolution"

(HAS, Jan 10) is the coccyx ("tail bone"); obviously believing that humans at one time had tails.

Supposing we had had tails: who or what decided we should now not have them; and why did that decision/natural selection/evolutionary process affect all humans, causing all to be without tails?

Surely some humans would have found them very useful and would have wished to retain them. So why has the whole human race evolved with such uniformity? For there is not a single human being living or recorded in history as having a tail.

The theory of evolution is based on tales, not on fact. There is no fossil evidence or any other evidence to support this assumption. - Colin G Farquhar, Framwellgate Moor, Durham.

HOUSING ECONOMICS

AS the Bank of England raises its interest rate, those homeowners who borrowed up to a dangerously high level just to get onto the housing ladder will be fearing the worst.

Many first-time buyers go for houses outside their price range, so why don't they go for more modestly priced homes? My belief is that many of these homes are in the hands of greedy people who can afford to buy second, third houses, etc.

They have stripped away a whole layer of affordable housing, denying their less wealthy fellow citizens the chance to own their own home, while at the same time charging extortionate and crippling rents.

This exploitation should be stopped. - D Brearley, Middlesbrough.

BOWLER ANSWER

IN answer to Chris Wardell's request for information about where to buy a bowler hat to wear for St George's Day (HAS, Jan 15), could I inform him that Madhatters (Lincs Ltd) have them for sale, priced £55, though in black only.

If Mr Wardell would prefer a red one, they can be purchased via a US website - www.uniformalwarehouse.com.

I trust he will have no problem with the traditional brolly. - Kev McStravick, Darlington.

SPELLING

IN a report of a theft case at Teesside Crown Court (Echo, some editions, Jan 12) you referred to a "stationary" store; is this to distinguish it from a mobile shop?

When I was at school we were taught that the best way to remember the correct spelling of "stationery" was to think of "e"

for envelope. - Peter Elliott, Eaglescliffe.