Readers' letters - April 26

If Theresa May thinks she has called her election in time, then based only on the situation in education, she is surely wrong.

Parents have now seen what teachers have known through experience for some time now. Ignorant political interference from successive Governments has reduced what should be the happiest days of our children’s lives into ones of trauma.

How many parents see their kids’ favourite teachers suddenly leave?

Qualified, dedicated teachers are leaving the profession and their charges in droves.

These are teachers burnt out before they get properly started, and those burnt out when they have years more to give.

Parents see their own children, tested to oblivion, hysterical at the age of ten, at the very thoughts of SATs.

Parents are being criminalised for taking their own children on holiday. Whose children are they? The State’s? This country is penalising parents for wanting to spend more time with their own children and give them experiences they couldn’t afford or which aren’t available during the normal holiday period.

Parents know that funding cuts are losing us teacher assistants and are increasing class sizes.

And above all parents know that schools are being put in the hands of the privateers, and taken out of the hands of experienced educationalists. And, if they didn’t already know, they will soon, that they don’t even need to be consulted anymore.

In the UK the privateers are the academisers. If it was up to teachers and parents, no schools would become ‘academies’. Sadly a combination of a succession of ignorant secretaries of state and governing bodies have allowed businesses to expand their money-making plans into the field of education.

Academisation is not just putting control of education into the hands of the privateers. It is a land grab.

The public, tax-payers’ school buildings and the land that they stand on are just given away to the new owners.

If we don’t stop this Government’s disastrous uninformed “educational” policies, this generation of 10-year-olds will be the illiterate, uncreative, disillusioned adults of the 2030s.

Victoria Jaquiss

Address supplied

politics

Use your vote – make it count

With Theresa May denying seven times that she would call an early election and breaking promise after promise in the last Conservative election manifesto, it would seem an honest political leader is as rare as hen’s teeth.

In stark contrast Jeremy Corbyn is just that, a political leader who tells it like it is, without spin.

At this election, no-one will be able to hide behind the excuse of not voting “because they are all the same”.

An early election suits the Tories since they know only too well that rising inflation, public service cuts and a declining economy lie ahead.

Like the Russian or Turkish presidents, Theresa May wants to win a big majority to “crush opposition” and stifle dissent as Tory policies worsen our quality of life.

Can Corbyn win?

The political establishment say not, but the results of the USA election and the Brexit referendum tells us it’s the people who will decide the outcome and not the smug elite.

Use your vote and make it count.

Dave Parker

via email

brexit

Waste of time dealing with EU

The British electorate voted to leave the EU on June 23 last year, so why are we wasting time negotiating with these self-appointed, self-serving nonentities?

Donald Tusk has made his opening demands for £52bn and a say in how Gibraltar is dealt with.

The Prime Minister should now say that these terms are totally unacceptable and, if further negotiations are to proceed, they must be completely withdrawn.

Britain should clearly state now that we will not pay a single penny of a so-called divorce settlement.

These demands have once again shown that we British cannot negotiate with these people and should not waste time and money trying.

How can you negotiate or why would you want to negotiate with an organisation that bans you from any of its meetings while you are still a fully paid-up member?

This is the result of the trap that is Article 50.

There are about 160 countries in the world who are not in the EU, and only 27 that are, so who needs the EU? A far bigger market awaits us.

Don Wood

Address supplied

crime

Punishment too lenient

When I read a recent LP article about a man who only got sentenced to 20 months jail for conning his girlfriend out of £25,000, I was disgusted with the punishment because it was far too lenient for the amount of money he had swindled.

If you have ever been conned heavily out of money, it is bound to feel a lot more like a serious rather than a trivial crime because of the heartbreak and humiliation it causes. Con artists and scammers are human vermin and the scum of the earth.

R N Coupe

Lostock Hall

north korea

Policeman of the world

Just what is the Government of the United States up to, with all the sabre-rattling against North Korea?

Maybe they should remember that the US, France, Australia and Great Britain tested and stored nuclear weapons in the 1950s and 60s. And yet when North Korea tests a rocket or two, the US Government act like hysterical children, shouting and screaming that they are a “rogue state” and that “appropriate action must be taken”. As far as I can see, the only ‘rogue state’ appears to be the USA! What does President Trump want? Another Vietnam?

Leave North Korea alone, America, and stop trying to be the world’s policeman.

Edward Mitchell

Address supplied

health

Decline of NHS in England

The recent article in The Times, describing how a successful cancer treatment is going to be available in Scotland but not in England, demonstrates yet again the decline of the National Health Service in England under Cameron and May. Now that we have a General Election in June, there will be an opportunity for voters to reject the right-wing obsession with cuts and privatisation. Our NHS is under threat. If you value it, vote for it.

Dave Savage

Preston & South Ribble TUC

language

I switch most comedies off

I agree with Mr Graham Archer’s letter (April 17).

I also deplore foul language, I turn most of these comedy programmes off.

I also find that I start to read a book, get into the story, then the foul language starts.

Mrs Jean Moore

Ashton