Letters: Monday January 11 2016

Excuse for more taxes

Sir,

Like many others I an intrigued by the claim

that the recent floods in the North of the country are in fact Unprecedented in Cumbria and York.

There has been severe flooding in the Trent Valley back as far as: 1141, followed by many more in;1309,1403,1683,1795,1824,1852,1875,1947, and 1954. In the last two mentioned there were 9000 properties affected.

Yet all the so called experts are bent on blaming Climate Change As you will all recall it used to be called Global Warming. The change has been so that politicians and their ilk can foist on "Joe Public" ever more taxes. On Fuel,Garbage,Gas Guzzling Cars, Air flights et al.

Dr Singer who is an eminent authority on Weather Services has stated that Nature Not Human Activity rules the climate. As part of his study into these Climate Changes he states:

Man made Gases can contribute in a very minor way to current warming..

I guess in this country it started off in a serious way with Gordon Brown getting into Number 10 Downing Street. We all know that he spent an extra Trillion Pounds of our money in his 10 years at Number 11 Downing Street.He was to go on to spend even more on totally absurd projects.

All of a sudden he had to get even more money so what did he do? He jumped on the Global Warming Bandwagon. And we have been paying through the nose ever since and indeed continue to keep paying.

The next time any of you fly off on holidays just take a look out of the window from thousands of feet.Hopefully without a cloud in sight so that you have a panorama that stretches across the galaxy. From up there the the idea that little old insignificant us can change the weather seems to be totally ridiculous.

That there is a change in the weather there is no dispute, but when we look back at history there have been so many different weathers. The Thames freezing solid and fairs held on it, the roman growing vineyards in this country of ours.

It, the weather goes in cycles, 10,000 years ago it was the last ice age perhaps we are still coming out of it who knows?

So in conclusion Yes I am extremely sorry for all those poor people in the north of the country who have suffered so badly , indeed my heart goes out to them and yes we should help them.

One thing we should do is get rid of Liz Truss the Environment Secretary. She has no idea what she is doing (Little as it is) instead it needs someone with civil engineering knowledge who will do his/her job and totally ignore these edicts from Brussels that sat we cannot dredge our rivers. Had this been done we could possibly have avoided much of the flooding. Who the hell are Brussels that they can tell us what we can and cant do in our own country.

They like many other were glad to see our boys in 1944.

Roll on the Referendum and lets get away from all that nonsense.

David Collins

61 Blake Crescent

Swindon

SN3 4LR

01793 826957

71 Merlin Way,

Covingham,

Swindon.

It is time the politicians stopped dishing out the bull manure with the mushroom syndrome as afters . It is quite clear to anyone with normal vision.That the vast majority of immigrants swamping Europe are fit young men . My personal opinion is that they should being standing their ground, and defending their countries . As many of the men of our proud nation have done on numerous historical occasions .The only thing these many self confessed draught dodgers should be granted is a one way ticket back to the military police they fled from.

The women of Cologne suffered two rapes and 100 attacks on New Years eve. The women clearly stated that the perpetrators were foreign men .This conduct according to the national press is happening in Calais and in many European countries. Many of these immigrant cultures have no respect for white women , treating their own women as subservient. Before the, I would take one in tomorrow brigade start replying. May I remind them of recent criminal cases regarding sexual abuse of young white women in Rotherham, and on our doorstep in Oxford . Allegedly ignored for years by the political correct, do gooders. On the now discredited, altar of the misguided. In case of offending multicultural zealots.

Anyone arriving in a foreign country seeking asylum, or gaining asylum. Then acting in this manner towards the opposite sex. Should be sent back where they came from faster than they climbed the fences at Calais. Conduct, that the vast majority of British men, young and old, would never even contemplate because of our respect for our ladies . Nor would any decent man tolerate such abuse on a female, in his presence. Bill Williams.

THERE appeared to be an interesting link between the letter from Barry E Woodham, January 6, and the report on the opposite page informing us that new figures show that there has been another fall in the amount of waste that is being recycled by Swindon households.

Mr Woodham explained that he, his wife and another person, who lives on the opposite side of Swindon to him, had become aware of an acrid taste to the air which is giving them a dry cough. He then went on to suggest that increased traffic levels caused by additional housing development could be causing the problem.

I think most residents would agree that road infrastructure in Swindon has failed to keep pace with rapid expansion and that the town's traffic management system is abysmal.

I do not claim to have a scientific answer but suggest we have had an exceptionally wet Autumn. Much of the Borough of Swindon is situated on, what is now, saturated clay. It seems reasonable to assume that humidity levels are high. Pollutants tend to dissolve in moist air which is why acid rain occurs in polluted areas.

Excessive traffic volume may be causing air pollution to reach dangerous levels.

The report on the latest waste collection figures informed us that the fall in recycling is thought to be caused by the change to the fortnightly collection of waste and the optional £40 additional tax imposed for green waste collections.

I suggest that the following scenario is likely.

The cost for green waste collection was previously covered by council tax. Swindon Council decided to introduce an optional £40 additional tax for each household which wanted to continue having their green waste collected. The green wheelie bins have limited capacity are emptied just once a fortnight with a four week collection break at Christmas. On occasions it is likely that more green waste per household is generated than will fit into a wheelie bin.

While I signed up for green waste collection it is noticeable that many households haven't.

Green waste can still be taken to the council's civic amenity site but how many people want to go to a site which was never designed or operated to be customer orientated?

It is possible that people without green wheelie bins are composting their green waste or maybe just dumping it in a corner of their garden. Another possibility is that they are choosing to have bonfires. Once burnt a large pile of organic matter is reduced a small amount of ash which can be raked into garden soil or bagged and deposited into a black wheelie bin.

Open fires cause smoke so maybe in combination with high levels of traffic fumes the blue summer haze across Swindon, which Mr Woodham refers to, was caused by Swindon Council's dubious recycling policy as well as its poor traffic management policy.

Our civic leaders want Swindon to feel more like a city so perhaps we should reduce pollution by having car free days similar to cities such as Paris or New Dehli.

I presume Swindon air quality is monitored so may be a Swindon Council representative can enlighten us on air pollution levels.

Yours sincerely

From: Mr K Kane,Wharf Road, Wroughton