Peer panels could save money
Your attack on Preston's peer panels (February 18) is premature and based on inaccurate assumptions.
It costs over £50,000 to keep a young person in custody for a year; a tenth of our overall budget for the three-year pilot project. If the pilot proves to be a success, millions of pounds of taxpayers' money could be saved by using this type of early intervention.
We don't claim to have a magic wand to solve anti-social behaviour and youth crime, but we are working hard to find ways to help young people turn their lives around.
The fact that some young people failed to engage with the project actually shows how the system is working. They will not be getting away with their actions but have been referred back to the police.
Those young people who are engaging with the panels are already showing signs that it is helping them to change their behaviour for the better.
You rightly state that it has taken time for the project to get started but this does not indicate failure or disagreements between agencies, as you suggest.
Instead it demonstrates our absolute commitment to getting our robust procedures in place from the start.
Simon Evans, Nacro area manager, Preston

Integrate parking and public transport
Why should council employees have to pay for parking, when councillors will be able to claim parking fees back as expenses?
These are the same councillors who currently have free dedicated parking spaces at County Hall which are often empty.
If Preston City councillors wanted to solve the problem, why don't they integrate the public transport system? By this I mean put the bus station on the ground floor of a multi-storey car park on the current car park at the rear of the Fishergate Shopping Centre, with covered access to both the train station and the shopping centre.
This would put the public close to the shops and the largest employer in the area. It would also free up Fishergate for pedestrianisation.
Bruce Ellison, Tanterton, via email

Government treating police so unfairly
Whether or not people support the police, or feel that their claim is justified, we should all remember the tremendous job they do despite this government's continuing efforts to hamper their work with more and more red tape.
You need look no further than the tragic case of Mr Newlove who was murdered by a thug who had been released from custody that day, against police advice.
Or even closer to home, the Preston youth who, according to his own sister, will ignore the conditions of his Asbo and return to Preston when he is released.
But the most important fact is that in giving up their right to take industrial action, they accepted the Government's word that they would abide by the independent panel's pay decision.
The Government has reneged on that agreement by not backdating the recommended award.
I have nothing against teachers, who also do an excellent job in increasingly difficult times, but does the Government's different approach to their pay have something to do with the fact that teachers can strike and the police cannot?
Mrs Marie Milne, Fulwood

We enjoy our river the way it is
It is clear that Mr McVicar ("Dam row can't stop river plans," LEP February 1) has never been to the River Ribble in Preston.
If he had, he would know that it is perfectly possible to walk beside it and enjoy the environment.
Indeed, thousands of people in Preston already do.
The Preston Vision Board, which Mr McVicar chairs, is clearly out of touch with the wishes and needs of local people who value the river and do not want it to become a concrete canyon.
The Vision Board is more interested in the needs of local developers than those of the local people or the environment.
It is instructive that Mr McVicar, in his role of vice-chancellor of the University, has already presided over the sale of the Harris orphanage to private developers, closing Moor Park observatory to the public and putting the future of the Harris Institute as a public resource in doubt.
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