It is refreshing to learn that, at long last, we have a council prepared to re-examine the use of speed cameras in Blackpool (The Gazette, November 7).
However their plan to rely on a report from one of their staff, who is immersed in the present, flawed system, is unlikely to give them a full picture.
If you believe their slogans seeking to
justify speed cameras then you believe in speed cameras.
They say speed kills. It doesn't, it is
inappropriate speed which causes a small minority of accidents.
Campaigners insist a third of all accidents are caused by speed.
However the Transport Research
Laboratory report L323, showed that excess speed was a factor in 7.3 per cent of
accidents. We are told on road signs Blackpool is 30mph or less.
It's not. Parts of Preston New Road and Progress Way have a 40mph limit.
When you realise that these are fallacies, you can see that speed cameras are just a form of tax collection, doing nothing for road safety. In order to see the full picture before
making a decision, I would urge the council to consult more widely.
Paul Garvin, the retired Chief Constable of Durham who rejected the Gatso cameras and enjoyed better than average accident figures, Safespeed and the Association of British
Drivers would all bring a fresh perspective to the table.
Then the council might realise the large sum of money directed, at best, at 7.3 per cent of accidents, would be better spent on addressing the causes of the other 92.7 per cent.
Richard Hook
Devonshire Road, Blackpool



Win back powers from EU
We stood in silence on Tuesday in memory of those who have died fighting for our freedoms.
It is a tradition which I am proud to follow, having also taken part in a Remembrance Day service on
Sunday. Paying tribute to those who made the ultimate sacrifice is the very least we can do.
What would those who gave their lives think about this country now?
What has happened to those
freedoms they died for?
Successive Governments have given them away by the bucket load to Brussels and Labour is hell-bent in parting with even more of our sovereign powers.
It was brought home to me last week when, in conversation, a
genteel, elderly retired Tory
councillor suggested that people should be protesting in the streets about our subservience to the EU.
What has this country come to, and more worryingly what lies ahead, unless we actually start to fight to regain those rights which our brave boys died for?
Philip Griffiths
North West chairman UKIP



Mindless vandals
I am a community nurse and would like to thank the
mindless idiots who decided to vandalise my car while I was visiting a patient.
When I returned to my car in a street off Talbot Road, Layton, my back driver's side tyre was flat. Two kind men changed this for me and I would like to thank them again for their assistance.
The garage personnel
informed me my tyre had been slashed and my bonnet had been scratched from top to bottom. My front driver's tyre had been slashed leaving me with a slow puncture.
Apart from the cost I was unable to attend to my
patients until the tyres were replaced.
This could have had a
detrimental effect on my
patients leaving them in
severe pain and distress.
So this act of lunacy not only affected myself but other members of the public.
Name and address supplied



Spitting is a horrid habit
I was in Cleveleys at the bus
station, where I noticed young teenagers spitting all the time.
I'm sorry to say this but I think this is very dirty and
unhygienic, especially if a small child fell over and got spit on their hands or clothes.
Who knows what that person who spat could have?
People are fined for dropping litter and dog mess so why can't these people be fined on the spot for spitting as well.
In certain parts of Spain there are notices up about spitting on the streets and a fine for doing so. This seems to be a nasty habit that should be stopped.
Susan Shuttleworth
Address supplied


Brown's policy is really to blame
It would take a book rather than a letter to reply to Jack
Croysdill's assertion that the
financial crisis was "brought about by irresponsible lending by banks internationally" (The Gazette, November 8).
Gordon Brown has been an
ardent supporter of
globalisation, and as such set up a light touch regulatory
system in 1999, which one of his own MPs dubbed "an old banger" after the Northern Rock collapse.
The pursuit of the same policy has demanded that the very rich be allowed to make full use of tax havens, such as the Channel
Islands, while everyone else has seen the mushrooming of stealth taxes, and the end of 10p tax band.
For most people there is now little to choose between two
parties.
Tom MacFarlane
Rossall Road
Cleveleys


Pony rescue went too far
I was appaled at the report on the RSPCA's rescue of pony from a local farm (The Gazette
November 6).
It is time for people to wise up and speak out against this
organisation.
The pony was a bit fat and
needed a pedicure.
Are these grounds to swoop and remove private property?
How dare they be given the
authority to remove a citizen's pet and not tell the owner where it is going?
Is the RSPCA really about the welfare of animals, or is it
simply trying to become Big Brother?
I for one will no longer give them donations.
J. Lyon
Kirkham