THE feature “What can York do to stay top for shops?” is welcome, timely and extremely alarming (The Press, October 15).

York is a warm, friendly and important city. But many parts of the city centre are shabby, unloved and showing real signs of long term neglect.

Indecision regarding fountains, A-boards, ill-matching street furniture, unmanaged trees, buckled railings and some almost dangerous pavements evidence this view.

City of York Council has for many years been stripped of finance, staff and good will and has my deep support. However, to retain this it must show more explicitly that it actually cares for the fabric of the centre.

There appears to be little overall planning or implementation of maintenance or even public expression of interest.

While the Business Improvement District proposals, funded by local businesses, might offer some hope, it would be a mistake to leave everything to one source of help.

Why has the city council not continued to support the Civic Trust’s paper Sustaining The City Beautiful which contained real and practical proposals to improve the city centre environment?

We all know that funding will always be an issue but more care and attention to detail by individual officers in the local authority, more planned maintenance and some visible signs of plans being worked on gradually would be a start.

All of this needs to happen in co-operation with agencies such as the Civic Trust who have a proven record in such work.

Stan Young, York

 

THE new report from Advice York on the city’s council tax support scheme makes it clear that the current level of payment required from our worst off residents is unsustainable.

It showed many people are paying this extra bill instead of paying rent, turning on the heating or buying food.

Others who do default are finding the maximum amount the courts will agree to deduct from their income/benefits in a year (on the basis that they cannot be expected to live on less) is lower than their outstanding annual debt.

So their debt is mounting up year on year.

The evidence makes it clear that the 30 per cent contribution is far too high – York is only one of nine councils out of 326 requiring this level.

When the scheme was introduced in 2013 the Greens proposed an 8.5 per cent contribution level but with no political support.

Now all parties can do something about this - Advice York suggest a reduction to 17 per cent would be a good target figure in line with what the courts think people can possibly manage.

Let’s hope the review proposals coming to executive on October 29 result in a positive outcome.

Denise Craghill, Green Party councillor for Guildhall ward, York

 

THE letter from Tracey Simpson-Laing (The Press, October 15) was an exercise in the usual progressive narrative that this island nation would not have existed without immigration, thus allowing the idea to develop that there is no indigenous people of these islands.

Ms Simpson-Laing should consider the research of David Goodhart, of Demos, a liberal leaning thinktank, who noted that in the period between 1066 and 1948, there was barely 500,000 inward migrants to these shores, which plays out in sharp relief against the figures since 1997 to date.

Additionally, research at Oxford has concluded that the largest DNA print in percentage terms on the peoples of these islands dates back some 12,000 years, with Roman, Nordic, Norman barely registering and the supposed Anglo-Saxon tsunami at barely five per cent.

Secondly, Ms Simpson-Laing asks us to consider the actions of the EDL, conflating them with groups like Combat 18.

The EDL was formed in direct response to events which saw Muslim demonstrators abusing British soldiers on the streets of a British city while the police stood by.

In the interests of balance, Ms Simpson-Laing should perhaps consider that it was not members of the EDL that beheaded a British soldiers on the streets of Woolwich, or blew up London buses and tube trains.

The debate is more nuanced than those such as Ms Simpson-Laing would care to admit.

Andrew Paul, Lansdowne Terrace, York

 

FORMER councillor Tracey Simpson-Laing wrote to criticise Cllr Mark Warters’ views on immigration (Letters, October 15).

As Tracey points out, this country was subject to waves of immigration in the past.

However, that took place slowly over centuries, involved relatively small numbers and was mainly from continental Europe and the Commonwealth.

We also had a lot of migration from this country to the Commonwealth, which kept the population in balance.

The immigration issues this county faces today are completely different to what took place in the past.

There are complex problems involved in taking large numbers of immigrants who cannot speak our language, have no common cultural or religious values, have no useable work skills for our economy and who have no means to support themselves.

If Tracey Simpson-Laing says Cllr Warters is wrong to be anti-immigration, the question I have for her is how many immigrants does she propose to help, how does she intend to feed and house them and who will pay for it?

And what about our own young people, don’t they have a right to jobs and housing?

Nobody would deny the plight of refugees is terrible but, in my view, Cllr Warters has every right to be concerned about mass immigration and you should be too.

Peter Broadley, Holtby, York