Youths warmed my heart on frosty eve
11:29am Friday 10th February 2012 in Your Say
Young teenagers and young adults in Swindon, and nationally, often get a bad press, sometimes fairly, often not.
On Saturday night in awful, treacherous weather, I lost control of my vehicle on a murderous surface of compacted snow and ice.
I ended up on a pavement with the front end of my Ford Focus clunking into a low garden wall and the rear bumper came off.
A blizzard was blowing but I came to a gentle halt – however, I couldn’t go forward or move back.
Then out of the white out came four young men and two young women.
After a brief chat they bounced my car sideways and pushed me 50 yards up a slope and I managed to slalom the half mile home.
I yelled out my thanks to my adolescent saviours and if they read this they will know who they are.
Cometh the crisis, cometh six good hearted, helpful young people.
They put their effort, muscle and kindness on the line on a truly vile, appalling winter’s night.
Double dip recession, government cutbacks, growing unemployment and lots of other bad news make big headlines but the world is still full of natural, instinctive human kindness and care.
A costly repair and a new bumper but no matter!
My young helpers underpinned my belief that the glass of goodness is always half full, the often maligned young folk capable of proactive, and reactive virtue.
Thank you, my youthful Galahad lads and lasses. You gave an old fellow a helping hand when it mattered most and sent me homeward on an Arctic night with a warm, rosy glow, my faith and optimism for the future reassured!
Brian Mansfield Clevelands Avenue Swindon
Faith restored
May I thank the anonymous person who found my dropped wallet in Asda Walmart, and drove seven miles to return it to me through my front door in Cricklade, not even taking any money out of it for their pains! Acts like this restore one’s faith in human nature – thanks!
R Griffiths Cricklade Swindon
Let’s start over
In December, I visited the cemetery where my Jewish grandparents are buried.
It’s a bleak place, full of headstones with names that you can’t pronounce because they belonged to people who fled Europe during the time of the Nazis.
To survive, they had no choice but to leave everyone and everything behind that they loved or valued.
Millions lost their homes, their families, their individual identities, and their lives, a time of unimaginable horror.
Because of this, the word Nazi still has the effect to ‘pierce’ and to create a profound reaction even today, so in an ideal world, it needs to be used with great care.
Councillor Geoff Reid, made reference to echoes of Germany (manipulation of facts/ misinformation) in a style of behaviour connected to the housing debate.
From my own perspective, whilst I think he was right to issue an apology, I hope that he still feels able to express himself openly, because that is a precious right denied to many.
I also read Rod Bluh's press release and I understand him having a strong reaction. I assume that like Geoff, he issued this in a heated moment, about something that he cared strongly about.
In hindsight there is common ground and an opportunity for learning.
I’m just an ordinary non political person who, along with more than 200 people, two MPs, three independent firms of experts, an Olympics infrastructure expert, teachers, headteachers, a chair of governors, representatives of residents groups and the Civic Voice, all spoke out opposing the council’s Croft proposal.
During the process many in the local community experienced “misinformation and manipulation of facts”.
Because of this, I attended the scrutiny meeting as I felt that it was my duty to highlight this to the committee. On doing so, I was publicly shouted at by the Chair and told that there is no scrutiny of planning.
Despite being contacted and advised by both Conservative and Labour councillors, I chose not to report the Chair of Scrutiny to the Standards Committee, but instead accepted his apology and I asked that all others attending in future are shown greater care.
My experience is totally insignificant compared to those of Nazi Germany, but I do strongly believe that anywhere or at any time where misinformation, manipulation of facts or in Churchill’s own words “catalogues of errors” are experienced, they should be openly challenged.
Reflecting on those who lost their lives, either in the Holocaust or in fighting to protect our freedoms, I think many would wish for us to behave better towards each other than this, and to use this opportunity to begin to do so.
Carole Bent Old Town Swindon
Court napping?
I wonder just where CJ Meek has been these last few years.
The UK Supreme Court has been in business since October 2009. It was set up under the Constitutional Reform act of 2005. It is the final judicial appeal court taking over that role from the House of Lords. It sits in the refurbished Middlesex Guildhall, just across Parliament Square from the Houses of Parliament.
Geoffrey Heaford Highworth Swindon
Fool’s gold
Gordon Brown sold 395 tons of British gold reserves between 1999 and 2002.
The average price received was $276 dollars an ounce.
The recent gold price on 1st February 2012 was very much higher at $1,738 dollars an ounce.
At current prices this means a loss of $1,462 dollars on every ounce of gold that was sold.
What is even more annoying is that Gordon Brown exchanged Britain’s gold reserves for Euros.
A very substantial part of Britain’s reserves are now held in Euros, a currency that is on the verge of going bust. This was a very bad decision by Gordon Brown.
Steve Halden Beaufort Green Swindon
United we stood
Mr Ing bemoans the arch buffoon Boris Johnson saying foreigners are getting jobs because the English are lazy, but this is just the well used Tory ploy of dividing the working class in order to rule them.
He unfortunately goes on to say that the English cannot be lazy as they have won two world wars.
It was the United Kingdom that fought those wars, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England, leaving aside the Commonwealth and Empire troops that fought alongside the British, and leaving aside the fact it was the Americans who prevented us from losing both those wars.
It is a sad fact, but it is this very attitude that the other countries in the United Kingdom are part of England that is driving Scottish nationalism and is threatening to split our nation apart.
Our country is the United Kingdom and I for one am proud of our country, although I would be the last to say it has no faults.
Steve Thompson Norman Road Swindon
No justice
So another trader has been driven out of Swindon town centre (Adver, February 3).
Judge Euan Ambrose said, of the doughnut seller, that “as the law stands, the presence of his van caused an obstruction on the highway that prevents pedestrians from freely, safely or conveniently walking across that part of the highway”.
What a load of rubbish!
The uneven surface causes much more of an obstruction than any trader’s van.
Nearly every one of the slabs is broken and uneven. They replaced the Canal Walk slabs that didn’t need replacing but the ones in Havelock Square, outside Iceland, are terrible and yet nothing has been done about them.
Perhaps if someone trips and hurts themselves and then sues the council, something will be done.
Mrs L Townsend Redcliffe Street Swindon
