Private schools a vital cog

PLEASE may we be spared further 19 century class warfare and spite over people buying private school education. By relieving the rest of us from educating their children they are saving us, the taxpayers 7 per cent on the nation’s bill for education. Is that not public benefit enough?

Many parents meet the fees through considerable financial cost to themselves: budget holidays, third hand cars and a wardrobe stocked from the sale rails etc.

Apart from bringing money into the country, the value of foreign students is the international connections they bring.

Closer to home, education is one of the main economic drivers of Lancashire’s economy. The schools offer a lot to the community in many different ways to those who are open-minded enough to take up their offer,

There are excellent and committed teachers but the system is dominated by an out of date educational ideology.

The comprehensive system was an exercise in social engineering which has not only failed, it has also short changed over four decades of our nation’s young people. Different children have different needs – I should know.

It was clear to me when our children were at primary school that one would cope with the academic system whereas the other would thrive on a technical college sandwich course. The former is now a consultant physician and the latter is now a technical consultant in a small software company that operates globally.

What moral right does your correspondent to have to pontificate on how others choose to spend their money? Please get up to date – we are now in the world of the twenty first century.

Des Bradley, via email

Throw book at library wreckers

I AM sure that there are plenty who would take issue with suggestions that libraries are businesses and if they are not working then they should be shut down.

We have an incumbent Government which is destroying local communities with its ill-fated mantra that running a country is like running a household budget.

We have seen schools having to cut teachers (imagine that), community centres closing down, bus services being cut and all the while the national debt grows and grows and grows.

The likes of libraries, post offices, rural bus services and schools are not businesses that are there to make money. They are to keep communities alive and vibrant, rather than becoming dormitory towns.

Any idea that libraries are no more than shelves of books is an insult to those who visit them to use a computer, to apply for a job or just for interaction with someone else.

I doubt that councils wished to work with local community groups, but this has been forced upon them by a Government which seems to have little idea about how to govern.

Tony Watson, via email

Election call opportunism

A QUICK letter on the snap General Election next month.

Theresa May, who was a terrible Home Secretary, who was never elected to the Tory leadership and the office of Prime Minister, has called for an election at a time that suits her own ambitions.

In my view, Labour has committed to the mistake of fighting this election instead of holding back and building a movement. And at a time when we need a strong opposition in the Commons.

This has been attempted before. Switch parties. It was Gordon Brown who like Mrs May had been installed as Prime Minister but wanted more loyal MPs seeking promotion and an easy life. But he did not have the backing of the Sun newspaper and the press generally.

It is likely that the Tories will win many seats from Labour. I hope to see a much bigger vote for UKIP this election and enough votes from Labour to get a valid opposition.

So I appeal to you vote your conscience with no fear of the outcome.

Leo Robinson, via email