Readers' letters - March 9

In reply to Chris Moncrieff’s article, This tolerance beggars belief (LP March 8).

I remember olden times when we lived in dire poverty.

But relatives lived nearby and there was a ‘community spirit’.

We live in another world today.

We hardly know our next door neighbours due to people always on the move and a lack of community spirit.

Many communities were destroyed in the 1960s.

As for people begging (down on their luck) on the streets, there could be many reasons for this. These could be social problems like drug addiction, alcoholism, and a lack of support services.

There are also more family break-ups today.

Has there not been a change in policy, resulting in cuts in benefits?

Does this mean homeless people are resorting to begging on the streets?

They should not be punished for begging unless they are aggressive or intimidating, then it could be a breach of the peace.

Also is there a change in policing methods towards begging?

For instance, councils may find the beggars make the streets look untidy.

This could create an increase in statistics.

We also have the poor immigrant homeless people.

Why don’t we design new homeless shelters and build them?

I remember large lodging houses for homeless men ‘down on their luck’ in old Glasgow but many were a step up from the poorhouse.

When some people see a person in the street begging, it makes them think of a relative or friend who suffered social problems and they will always put a few coppers in the beggar’s cup. Or else people can just walk by. We have a choice.

No one is forcing us to give to beggars.

There are many valid reasons for the increase in begging.

Pat O’Connor

Blackpool

transport

It’s like a war zone road

A couple of years ago, the Lancashire Post ran a story about a pothole under the flyover between Longton and New Longton that the council failed to repair. It was fixed three days later.

There is now damage and multiple potholes everywhere along Chapel Lane and Station Road in New Longton (pictured, below inset).

New Longton is the cut- through for HGVs to the motorways so the road gets hammered 24 hours a day, which sends shock waves through people’s homes, so I can imagine how that damages the road.

Holes are appearing day by day and the broken tarmac seems to be evaporating entirely.

The locals are paying over £2,000 a year in council tax, yet the road resembles one of any war-torn country.

Jos Haydock

via email

transport

Plastic for potholes

There have been several reports in the media, both nationally and locally, regarding potholes in our roads and plastic waste around our shores. But one could easily be a solution to the other.

Recycled plastic can apparently be melted into bitumen and used as a road surface that is more environmentally friendly.

Perhaps Lancashire County Council could share some of their estuary detritus with land-locked councils and help improve their road surfaces too.

Once they’ve attended to ours, obviously.

Gordon Arkwright

Morecambe

brexit

Euroscepticism on the rise

The result of the Italian election with the Eurosceptic Five Star Movement receiving a third of the vote is great news. I congratulate the party in being the single party taking the largest vote and it shows the way the wind of politics is clearly blowing.

People in Italy, as well as elsewhere in Europe, are fed up with the EU’s misguided immigration policy which is leading to resentment and will eventually bring about the end of the failing bloc.

And meanwhile let us not forget how the euro has caused such painful financial problems for various countries.

Euroscepticism is on the rise and the Brussels bureaucrats only have themselves to blame. They try to dominate member states but when it comes to elections and referendums, the public will put up with it no longer. The majority in this country voted to leave and that mood of wanting to take back running our own affairs is one spreading in other countries and I, for one, am delighted.

Paul Nuttall

North West MEP, UK Independence Party

weather

This is not the Arctic or Siberia

On the radio, there was a British teacher, working in central Russia, saying it was fairly mild at -25C, and when asked when the schools would close due to winter conditions, replied: “Junior schools are okay until it’s

-30, older kids just keep going.”

The entire ‘news’ of the ongoing winter conditions was ridiculous.

This is not the Arctic nor is it Siberia, it’s England on a cold day.

Paul Shervington

Address supplied