Anonymity is granted only at the discretion of the editor, who also reserves the right to edit letters.

Credit when it’s due

I WAS disappointed to see your story in this week’s paper, “Out of Hours Care rated Outstanding by CQC” relegated to a couple of hundred words, tucked away, on an inside page.

This is an amazing Good News Story for Wiltshire surely worthy of celebration?

How often do you read of other providers around the country struggling to staff their services or even closing down and leaving patients without cover.

To be rated Outstanding twice, in successive inspections should be lauded.

Sadly, I suspect, the story would have received far more coverage, if CQC had rated the service as Needs Improvement.

DR JAMIE BROSCH, Retired Chippenham GP

Hunt for Kathleen

I AM trying to find any information about one Kathleen Ann Legg, who was married at St Cyriac’s Church, Lacock in 1970. She at that time was 19 and lived on the Lackham Estate. Friends from 50 years ago are trying to make contact with her.

PETER LOUCH, pandmlouch@btinternet.com

Thank you Masons

ON Saturday the Loganberry Trust tested 256 men for prostate cancer using the PSA test method, a record number, not that it is a competition), in The Bouverie Hall, Pewsey. We were sorry that at the end of the session we had to turn men away.

The trust were asked to undertake the session by the Lodge of Goodfellowship, Freemasons in Marlborough, who had donated £1,000 to their cause.

Our thanks to The Loganberry Trust, the Bouverie Hall committee, members of the Lodge of Goodfellowship and their wives, and the men of Pewsey, who supported us in such large numbers, were very patient, and raised a further £1,200 for the Loganberry Trust.

You all made it a fantastic and worthwhile event

FRANCIS BROOK, Charity Steward, Lodge of Goodfellowship, no. 8388

Wasting our cash

I READ with interest the article that the last 12 Planning Applications refused by Councillors against the recommendations of Planning Officers, costing Council Officers extra work and the Council extra costs.

A valid objection to a planning application includes: Loss of light or overshadowing; Overlooking/loss of privacy; Visual amenity (but not loss of private view); Adequacy of parking/loading/turning; Highway safety; Traffic generation; Noise and disturbance resulting from use; Hazardous materials. There may well be other local issues.

Planning Officers make their recommendations in good faith having tested the applications against the Planning Regulations and generally get it right.

Councillors on the other hand are obliged to heed local concerns from the residents who elected them and therefore have to be seen to be acting in support of them, perhaps sometimes for electoral reasons.

Quite often objections from well meaning local residents do not come under the allowable objections to Planning Applications and are doomed to failure; the Planning Inspectorate then overturn the Council’s refusal decisions.

A total of 12 overturns in a row is costly for Wiltshire Council and it is clear that instead of Councillors just supporting local residents’ objections by calling the application in and then refusing it, they would best serve the community by explaining to local residents that the grounds for a particular application are not allowable.

If the Planning Regulations are seen to be unfair as to what is a valid objection then the perhaps the law needs to be reviewed and they should make representations to their MP to get it done.

In the meantime time, effort and money is being wasted.

PETER L COLLINS, Chilmark Road, Trowbridge

Theft on High St

ONCE again the hypocrisy of petrol and fuel suppliers in the UK can be clearly seen, telling us that they are reducing prices in line with the current 10% reduction in the cost of Crude Oil in the last couple of weeks.

Tell us another one when the true fact is, a penny here and a penny there in no way reflects the real reduction in costs.

It really is theft on the High Street when they retain so much profit at the expense of the motorist.

Overnight the price of Crude has dropped over 4% how long before that reduction is seen, unlike the swift actions to increase prices at the pumps from early May.

£1.29 for diesel and £1.26 for petrol currently should in fact be £1.20 for petrol and £1.23 for diesel, noting of course that the diesel production is less expensive than petrol, but many are being punished for diesel car ownership.

That is the case with Supermarkets but if we examine costs from other suppliers the case is even more disgusting.

We were told many moons ago that there was an enquiry into the fuel supply companies and their cost factors, have I missed something or did it never get completed?

KENNETH F. MITCHELL, Top Corner, High Street, Uffiington

Well done CUDS

ONCE again CUDS have worked their magic on our roundabouts and grassy nooks and crannies along the pavements, transforming them into miniature wild flower meadows.

Their efforts are an absolute delight and never fail to cheer me up and make me grateful for their dedication to helping make Devizes a lovely place to live. A huge thank you to all the members of CUDS.

MARION ROWLAND, Devizes

D-Day memories

IN these days of political unrest it has been good to step back and pause to remember the 75th Anniversary of D-Day, a time when so many thousands of loyal service men and women gave their lives to save us from a Nazi regime.

The names of those who gave their lives stand proudly on the War Memorials in many towns and villages. After so many years families are still grieving over the loss of loved ones.

As a schoolboy at the time of D-Day as I played in the back yard through the open window I could hear the voice of John Snagge reading the six ‘clock evening news that D-Day had commenced.

British and American troop were landing in France, I could see lines of gliders going up from Keevil.

After so many years memory can we know play tricks but your recent excellent article on wartime RAF Keevil confirmed many gliders carrying British troops were going up that evening, and would arrive over the beaches after midnight.

STANLEY H. JONES, Hilperton Marsh

Do me a favour!

THIS week’s letters page was a corker. How gratifying to see that Mr Rowland Pantling is so keen on recycling.

Not only is he continuing to reuse some of the lies spawned in 2016 by the Brexit campaign, he has added a few of his own to craft a perfect storm of complete gibberish about sovereignty and our constitution.

I note that he has also found some more rubbish to recycle in your pages, this time about climate change.

More than 90% of scientists - who know the facts, and how to interpret them - agree that climate change is a genuine crisis, man-made but avoidable if we take the appropriate actions quickly enough.

People like Mr Pantling will ignore the evidence and believe anything which allows them to carry on consuming the world’s resources and producing greenhouse gases. Their children and grandchildren will curse them, but by then it will be too late.

Another of your correspondents, Mr Smith of Calne, believes we should heap the highest of honours on our four living ex-Prime Ministers. Do me a favour!

One is an alleged war criminal; one is widely regarded as the worst Prime Minister EVER, and the other two, had they any sense of shame, would spurn such an offer. We owe them nothing. They owe us, at the very least, an apology.

Most hilarious was the suggestion that Nigel Farage should be given a peerage! That’s when I realised his letter was an attempt at humour.

Farage is a dangerous man, a front for the extreme right.

He has done, and is doing, untold damage to this country, and deserves to be drowned in milkshakes.

DECLAN MCSWEENEY, Victoria Road, Devizes

Having a laugh

TO have one letter published in your esteemed paper is a wonder, two would be unbelievable, almost as unbelievable as the letter written by Mr Rowland Pantling of Pewsey.

I have emailed his rant all over the world and friends in America, Australia, Germany and Italy have found it very funny and asked if this was another example of what is known as English Humour?

Your paper would be on to a winner if you sponsored next year’s Arts Festival in Devizes in a debate featuring Mr Rowland Pantling of Pewsey and Sir David Attenborough OM CH CVO CBE FRS FLS FZS FSA FRSGS on understanding Climate Change. I for one would buy a ticket, or even two.

ROGER DAY, Wedhampton

He’s taking a risk

ENJOYED Nicholas Smith’s joke in Letters of last week , ‘Nigel Farage needs a life peerage’ and ‘a knighthood for Mr May’. Very funny, well done!

He was taking a risk though as some readers might have taken it seriously and thought he meant it.

DAVE BUXTON, Morris Lane, Devizes

Beware posh people

WHEN historians look back at the prolonged Brexit crisis, the prominent role of two former members of the notorious Oxford Bullingdon Club, famous for its destruction of restaurants and other establishments, with immediate compensation demonstrating the wealth that places its members to be above the law, will feature strongly.

New research reveals posh people really do think they are better than others, even when they have no idea what they are talking about. The study on the relationship between over confidence and social class was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Both Cameron and Johnson are afflicted by this over confidence in their own abilities and irresponsible willingness to inflict damage on the country. They don’t care, they won’t have to clear up the mess.

Look at the number of extreme Brexiteers who have already jumped ship and gone to live abroad.

The over-confidence in their own abilities and misplaced ambition in seeking a role which is simply beyond them now grips leading contenders for the prime minister’s job.

The posh Brexiteers taking care of their own, totally out of touch with the problems and difficulties of ordinary people, letting the rest of us suffer.

A P MILROY, Bellefield Crescent, Trowbridge