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Election is coming

LATEST. New and improved! Deal. sounds more like an ad for a 1950s or 1960s washing powder! And nothing had really changed.

Well, talk about taking something to the wire and, given Mrs May’s duplicitous and tortuous actions and verbage, how on earth could MPs, of all views, have any chance to both study and get informed opinion and understand, to enable them to have an informed vote, on the latest offering on the ‘Deal’?

Looks like a jolly good reason for the continuing game of party politics rather than delivering on the instruction to our UK Parliament of the referendum result on the UK leaving membership of the European Union.

It is doing absolutely nothing to improve the political democratic deficit in the UK and more likely to continue the degrading thereof.

Having made the time and taken the opportunity to watch both the May/Juncker late night press conference on Monday, March 11 from Strasbourg following their latest negotiations, I was struck by Mr Juncker’s clear and unequivocable answer to a question from the media that, “This is the Deal or there will be no Brexit.’

Clear and concise, not subject to a translation error, said in English. A very transparent threat, regardless of whatever the UK Parliament were to decide in the following days and ignoring the UK Parliament having already enacted Article 50.

Mrs May, seated at his side, said nothing.

I have also watched the initial debate in Parliament on March 12 prior to their vote. Following the Attorney General’s usual eloquent address and explanation he had to advise that there was little changed in reality, that the UK could still be caught in the Northern Ireland backstop and that the right of the UK to leave the discussions on a unilateral basis was a UK unilateral statement, that is, not agreed by the EU but was the UK understanding of the Agreement and current situation. The basis for yet another future political quagmire.

The following convoluted Q & A in the House of Commons, including the broadcast of the European Select Scrutiny Committee, and the detailed pedantry, left me in no doubt that this latest version of Mrs May’s ‘new, improved, latest version 2.0’ would be a goldmine for international lawyers in the future, given that all the foregoing was undertaken in English, without interpreters and the nuances of other (foreign) languages and translations therein. Any deal so worded and open to interpretation will be a bad deal from the start.

The by-election on April 4 in Newport will be the first indication of the feeling of the electorate on its elected members in its UK parliament.

I am confidant that there will be many more to come and will not be unduly surprised to find that we will be faced with a General Election before this year is out.

Colin McNamee, Neville Park, Baltonsborough, Somerset

Build community

Further to the comments regarding Trowbridge town centre.

Government action, not money, is required for the regeneration of Trowbridge and other town centres. In terms of business operation, it is far more cost effective and of less environmental impact, for a customer to come to a shop for their purchase, rather than to sell online.

With online there is unnecessary packaging (surprisingly without the plastic bag tax), delivery costs to a home address and increased returns (up to 40 per cent on clothing).

Therefore, a simple change in our tax system retaining the level of tax take, but making it more balanced between online and retail, would encourage businesses to operate and invest in our town centres like Trowbridge.

In addition to higher business rates, it cannot be fair to tax a shop for a carrier bag, but not an online supplier for a mail order bag or to introduce congestion charging in our city centres together with punitive parking charges, but ignore the environmental impact of multiple delivery vans in residential areas.

What is often missed is that the fact that our town centres, with shopping and socialising, ensure social interaction, which I believe is fundamental in social cohesion.

We must come away from living online in isolation and build a community base. Otherwise I can only see gang culture and crime increasing.

This fact is recognised by those rehabilitating criminals as they encourage them to meet their victims.

Regrettably, this is not going to happen anytime soon, but perhaps we can all make a start with a simple ‘Good morning’ to everyone we meet in Trowbridge town centre?

Edward Kirk, Town and Wiltshire councillor for Trowbridge Adcroft

Town in a state

RECENT coverage in the Wiltshire Times about Trowbridge has highlighted differing views about the town. But there can be no dispute about the parlous state of the town centre.

Despite claims to the contrary the town centre is drab and decaying, and in terminal decline. And Wiltshire Council is largely responsible.

When The Shires was built in 1989 it provided a natural extension to the traditional centre focused around Fore Street, with the Asda supermarket as an anchor. It provided a vision for the future, cementing Trowbridge’s role as the county town. But far from building on that vision the council have since then allowed piecemeal development which has slowly eroded the viability of the town centre.

Allowing the Gateway development was a fundamental error of staggering proportions. What was the council thinking of? Instead of attracting new national tenants - always unlikely given the size of the town - it resulted in Boots, Argos and New Look relocating from The Shires and Fore Street, depriving the established town centre of three key retailers.

Together with the development of the Spitfire Retail Park on Bradley Road, and in particular the move by Knees there, Trowbridge town centre has immeasurably declined over the last few years.

Yes, the town has benefitted from the building of a new cinema and restaurants. But the heart of a town is the town centre.

As a retailer whose business started in 1990 in Trowbridge, in The Shires, and from then opened bookshops in over a dozen other towns, it is with great sadness that we have now closed our Superbook bookshop in The Shires.

In this age of internet shopping there are, alas, so few reasons to visit Trowbridge town centre.

Peter Bell, Bell’s Bookshops trading as Superbook, Centurion Way, Crusader Park, Warminster

Hearts torn out

OUR country has suffered an awful lot over the last few years. Our values, sense of humour and deep sense of family, humanity and decency have made us as a people stand proud in the face of adversity, but this atrocity has rocked kiwis everywhere to our core.

This mongrel has targeted our country because of all the good things we represent, he seeks to divide us, I would like to inform him he has failed. It’s pulled us closer. We circle and embrace physically, emotionally and spiritually our Muslim friends and all those who would be singled out for whatever reason. We are an inclusive, multicultural society striving for equality and harmony.

We stand before you, the rest of the world, a friendly little nation with huge ideals, with ours hearts torn out and our souls laid bare. See us. Feel the pain we feel as some members of our family have been murdered by forces outside of our borders. We are united in our grief.

We must, all of us worldwide, learn lessons from these horrific events.

Join with us, we are the world, we are one.

A Christchurch girl

Surname help

I WOULD like to thank those readers who replied to my earlier letters on surnames and their origins.

It is the rare and unsual ones which have always interested me. For example, Kellogg means ‘kill hog’ for a slaughterman and Holiday for someone born on a holy day.

Spiller means Jeller or Jester. But what about Whitefoot as virtually everyone in England had white feet when surnames began shortly after the Norman Conquest? One suggestion is that it means ‘fair foot’ but I am not so sure.

Readers wishing to know more about the origins of their surnames can write to me at 96, Genoa Court, Andover, SP10 5JD and I will do my best to assist them.

Richard J Kidd, Genoa Court, Andover

Think community

AS AP Milroy has stated in a recent letter, the birthing unit closures are just the thin end of the wedge. There is no scrutiny of, or control over, the new alliance of the Clinical Commissioning Groups of Bath, Swindon and Wiltshire who will be able to outvote the representatives of the Wiltshire group on the joint executive.

That executive will decide the health provision of the small rural communities and towns of Wiltshire and Somerset. Dominated by the urban Bath and Swindon, it is likely that provision for those rural areas will be eroded.

What is Wiltshire Council doing to monitor and scrutinise this combined ‘alliance’ and its impact on rural Wiltshire and its towns?

Already in Melksham we are seeing the erosion of health services. The threatened closure of a doctors’ surgery, having to go to Trowbridge for the out of hours service and minor injury service. Now the threat to the local community birthing unit with heavily pregnant Melksham mums having to travel much further to give birth.

Oversight of Wiltshire Health services lies with the Wiltshire Council Health scrutiny and health and wellbeing committees.

Wiltshire Council is swift to approve the extending of housing developments but such a increase in population surely has to have similar growth in medical services and facilities, not a reduction? Not everyone can afford BUPA like Wiltshire councillors!

Both county and town councillors must work together to defend and extend our health provision. Outreach consultant clinics must be widely available. These would help prevent the traffic logjam in RUH car parks, cut pollution in Bath and make such healthcare is much more widely available.

But will the vested interests rampant in the Wiltshire and other clinical commissioning groups be willing to consider the wider communities or will they continue to focus on their own narrow interests?

Sam Selman, Church Avenue, Melksham

Sneaky tax rise

I HAVE just received my council tax bill for the new financial year and to say that I am horrified at the increase would be something of an understatement. The council has tried to justify an increase of 7.3 per cent! But it just isn’t the size of the increase that angers me, it is the way that it has been calculated.

Due to the transfer of so-called ‘devolved duties’, (as reported in the Gazette & Herald, December 20, 2018), Chippenham Town Council has had to increase its precept by 37.5 per cent, presumably in order to pay the additional costs of highway cleaning, etc.

You would expect that the county would make a corresponding reduction in the county tax? Not a chance!

As well as increasing the tax by three per cent there are also increases in cost of running the police and fire services amounting to more than 16 per cent.

If the county is now not responsible for certain tasks, surely these funds should be transferred to the town council?

Doing a bit of research I found that if council tax is increased by six per cent or more, then a referendum must be held. That does not apply to town councils, so the cynic in me has concluded that Wiltshire Council has managed to increase my council tax by deliberately transferring some of its costs to Chippenham Town Council, resulting in an increase in its precept of 37.5 per cent, and thus avoiding a referendum. Talk about sneaky!

I recently received notification from Department for Work and Pension of an increase in my state pension for the next financial year.

When the council tax increase is taken into account, I will be £1.76 a month better off! Perhaps it would be good idea if the DWP sent all future state pension increases direct to the council, rather than to our bank accounts?

John Berry, Fallow Field Close, Chippenham

Nobody matters

HOW disappointing to read of Wiltshire Council’s intended closure of the Chippenham to Calne cycleway.

Whilst the rest of the country appears to be looking at opening new cycle paths Wiltshire appears to be doing the opposite.

Chippenham has already lost the cycleway to Lacock, now its last remaining safe cycle route is heading the same way. Perhaps the council needs to alter its logo: Wiltshire Council: where NOBODY matters.

Wil Hulbert, Dallas Road, Chippenham