This week's letters to the Times & Star

Last May the Allerdale Independent group formed a working relationship with the Conservatives. We had contacted the Labour group leader, Alan Smith, with a view to forming a rainbow Executive of three independents, two Conservative and two Labour but Coun Smith refused to work with the Independents, so we agreed a group of four independents and three Conservatives with an Independent leader Marion Fitzgerald, who asked to remain independent of our group.

We had what we thought was a good working relationship for just over nine months, despite our concerns with regards to the leader and deputy holding private meetings behind our backs and withholding information that all Executive members should have had access to.

We raised our concerns on several occasions at our weekly Executive meetings but our concerns were dismissed by the leader and deputy, which over the last month or so led our group to call for a vote of confidence in the leader Coun Fitzgerald in a bid to address our concerns about the lack of openness from the leader and her deputy. Regrettably, two days after our vote of confidence, Coun Fitzgerald resigned.

She then went on to attack the Independent group in the local press and accused us of refusing to take full responsibility for our important roles and of bringing negativity to every discussion and of having a permanent and unshakable distrust of staff and members. Not true!

Last May the West Cumbrian Independent group received 44 per cent of the votes in the local elections with both the Conservatives and Labour on 26 per cent. This gave our group a mandate to lead the council.

We put our trust in both Marion Fitzgerald and the Conservative group to form an alliance to lead the council for a four-year term, but regrettably the new leader of the council, Mike Johnson, sacked the three members of the executive last Thursday without any notification and we feel very disappointed for all our supporters who put their faith and trust in our group who in turn put our trust in Couns Fitzgerald and Johnson only to be stabbed in the back.

Moving on, we are planning to take back control of the council at the AGM on May 20 as we are the largest group on the council and we were given a mandate last May to lead it. However we suspect that the Conservative and Labour groups will join together and do a deal to prevent this, which would be very damaging for democracy in West Cumbria in that two political groups who strongly oppose each other could work together to cancel out what 44 per cent of the electorate voted for on May 2 2019.

The West Cumbria Independents campaigned for a change to the way Allerdale Borough council was run. We promised more openness, and we pledged to take national politics out of local government. However are we about to see national politics take local non-political elected councillors out of local government?

The voting public will be watching very closely and on behalf of my group of 17 non-political elected councillors and the 44 per cent of the electorate in Allerdale who voted for change, we hope both the Conservative and Labour councillors will respect what the public voted for.

Coun STEPHEN STODDART
ndependent town, borough and county councillor,
Moorclose, Westfield and Moss Bay ward

Arrogant folly

Have Allerdale councillors a political death wish?

At a time when the country faces one of its greatest challenges in generations, coronavirus, and the area itself is in the firing line for the creation of a unitary authority, why aren’t our councillors working together for the good of everyone in Allerdale?

If my understanding is correct, the current executive style of leadership places the power in relatively few hands but with the proviso that decisions then have to be ratified by the scrutiny committees and the full council. For the Tory group to stage what might be described as a coup d’etat when they have nowhere near a majority in the full council chamber is madness.

Can I ask, nay plead, with Couns Johnson and Smith, as leaders of the two main party groups, together with anyone who can be identified as speaking for the as many of the independents as possible, to self-isolate with sandwiches and drinks, lock the door and then stay there until they can agree a united way forward.

Not to do so risks having the folks of Allerdale’s interests subsumed by those of Carlisle, the affluent South Lakes and the 40 pieces of silver from the nuclear and shipbuilding lobby south along the coast.

Not to do so at this time of national emergency is also an act of arrogant folly.

ASHLEY TIFFEN
Aspatria

Abuse is never ‘harmless’

I WAS immensely saddened by your account of the trial of Father Gregory Carroll (or Peter Turner, as he later named himself). As you noted, the beginning of his wicked career of child sex abuse was what was erroneously regarded as “mild” or even “harmless” 30 years ago.

More recently it has become normal for most people to appreciate there is no such thing as “harmless” abuse – even the memory of a single episode can last a lifetime.

Thus one could say the then Abbot of Ampleforth who transferred Carroll/Turner to Workington was another victim (of a lesser kind) of abuse and the attitude of the time.

That man was Basil Hume, later to be Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, the head of the Roman Catholic church in England, an outstandingly good, wise and holy man who cannot have appreciated the horror that might arise from his decision, and it was this (and other churches’) attitude at the time to sweep any scandal or abuse under the carpet when it should have exposed and condemned it.

Already people close to Hume began to notice he had something on his conscience. He was in fact deeply troubled by the Carroll/Turner case and feared he had gravely sinned, but loyalty to the church meant he could not publicly criticise it.

Those puzzled by Hume’s troubled conscience began to guess at the cause when the Cardinal’s distress clearly grew when Carroll/Turner’s first trial revealed his appalling wickedness and that the idea of a “harmless” abuse was no excuse for his own decision, which he saw as his own wicked sin, still ignorant of what the terrible consequences of the church’s policy might be.

It is now believed that Hume’s early death resulted in part from his remorse – and all this was several years before the second trial exposed the sheer scope and consequence of Carroll/Turner’s subsequent career as you reported.

I could not presume to excuse Basil Hume’s blunder but I have a profound belief in the forgiveness of sins when the sinner repents, as Hume obviously did. If God can forgive, so should I.

A very sad story, but I have chosen to tell it because it also illustrates how the terrible tentacles of such abuse can extend far beyond the immediate victims. Nor can I pretend the situation has now been resolved. Despite churches and other bodies adopting “safeguarding” policies, too many still react with a cover-up instead of exposure.

DONALD LEIGHTON
Maryport

MP’s views on beer duty...

Regarding MP Mark Jenkinson’s mission to prevent a rise in beer duty, I wonder whether he is concerned about the health and welfare of his constituents?

Beer duty is a tax, and like other taxes on alcohol is required to help fund the negative impact that harmful alcohol use has on our society including on policing, the NHS, prisons, social services and benefits. The price of alcohol is often the only “brake” stopping a social drink becoming a harmful drink.

Since Scotland brought in minimum alcohol pricing in May 2018 (50p per unit) there have been measurable reductions in crime, deaths and hospital admissions related to alcohol. Like smoking legislation, is it time to follow Scotland?

To date Mr Jenkinson has voted with the government (rather than for the benefit of many of his constituents) 100 per cent of the time, including against clamping down on tax avoidance, extending full employment rights to all workers, ending in-work poverty, and introducing a real living wage.

SARAH CHAUDHRI
Bridekirk

...and on mental health

I READ with incredulity the statements in the Times & Star by Mr Jenkinson, where he quotes that mental health services in West Cumbria are failing and he has first-hand experience of this.

Such statements may be politically convenient but do not solve the issue.

Has he not thought about the impact that these remarks have on our hard-working nursing staff within mental health services in West Cumbria? He repeats the party line that the merger of mental health services with Newcastle, Tyne and Wear Mental Health Trust will solve all our problems. This could not be further from the truth. NTW is closing a fantastic facility at the Carleton clinic and is in the process of merging the Copeland and Allerdale mental health teams. Progress?

May I also remind him that his current party has been the dominant force in UK politics since 2010 so why are we in mental health services failing? Surely it has nothing to do with austerity and the consequent cutback of 20% in NHS funding...

Finally I am sorry he has first-hand experience of mental health failings in West Cumbria and sincerely hope that these issues were resolved satisfactorily. We in the NHS do care for everyone. Always.

LES BLACKLOCK
Recently retired West Cumbria mental health worker,
Workington

We’re not ALL online

If you are aged 70-plus and do not have the internet, do you feel that our generation is being ignored? Here are three examples of how our generation is being treated:

Free TV licences funded by the Government for all over 75s will come to an end on May 31 unless they are on pension credit, which is means tested and paid for by the BBC.

Podiatry: After consulting my GP, I periodically attend the podiatry clinic at Workington hospital. A letter arrived saying I would be assessed at my next visit to see if I should be removed from their list to free up time for those most in need. Someone I know who is 80, has spinal problems so bad he cannot sit comfortably, let alone reach his feet to cut nails, and is also diabetic, has been removed from their list. What chance for the rest of us?

Bin collections. There have been several news articles recently about the bin collections culminating in Allerdale deciding in its budget not to introduce a charge. Thank you for that.

We are also informed that the council is not providing printed bin calendars to residents this year – it is available on the council’s website. Fine – unless you don’t have the internet. There are actually some of us who have not got it and do not want it..

So how do we discover on which day the bins are collected, and what we need to put in them on the correct day in order for them to be collected at all? We have lived long lives without the internet. Why should we have to change if we would rather not?

I went to Allerdale House and asked politely and patiently if I could please have a copy of the bin collection calendar printed off for me on their computer. The equally polite and helpful lady on reception said she could not print one off as they are not being sent out now, they had to be printed off on the internet. I replied that I knew this but repeated that I was not on the internet. She understood my irritation. She was helpful and showed me an internal telephone I could use to talk to the department concerned.

I talked to yet another young lady in the Operations department requesting a copy of the calendar, convinced it was on their computer and it just needed a copy run off. She could not do this. Why?

After all the fuss and bother about who emptied the bins, and how often, and whether to charge for some of it, how are residents supposed to know what to put out for collections if they were not given information. I did assure her that I was sorry for having to take up the time of herself and the receptionist doing their best to be helpful but having to face an angry public, and not the people who made the inconsiderate decision not to issue calendars to residents who – by the way – are having to pay more council tax this year. Another case of pay more, get less?

She kindly brought up the information required and read it out over the phone. I wrote it down and thanked her for her help and time, time which was being used up by having to help me.

Do the people responsible for making this ‘no calendar’ decision know or care about the time used by their public-facing employees or the concern we residents – with no internet – feel?

Just as we thought the collection problem was solved it is here again. The message we appear to be getting is “OK it will be collected, but we are not letting you know what or when. If you want to know call at Allerdale House but we still won’t run a copy off for you. If you know anyone with the internet go and ask them to run you one off. Tell you what, just put something in a bin, any day you fancy, and if it is not collected try another one another day. When you work out the system write it down and use that.”

Sounds ludicrous doesn’t it but that seems to be the situation as it presently stands. If you know anyone, friend neighbour or relative who might just have the internet who would not mind running you a copy off, well and good. Get your coat on and go round their houses.

Is our generation, who experienced the end of World War II, to be so disregarded? Are you rubbing it in that we are at the end of the pier and you’ll push us off?

Mrs P. SCOTT
Seaton