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Potholes explained

Again and again we keep hearing excuse after excuse that it’s someone else’s department who is to blame for potholes in the same spot reappearing.

The main reason is that 99% of potholes are not repaired, they are temporarily filled with deferred Tarmac for a fast fix. They are not correctly edge sealed, they are not cut to a straight edge to allow edge sealant to be used to stop the rain water from getting underneath.

When rain water gets under Tarmac it forces the deferred Tarmac to crumble. When put under pressure by cars and lorries, there is only one way for it to go and that’s out of the pothole.

John L Crook, Haydon Wick, Swindon

Co-op is an asset

A FRIEND of mine has shown me the article you published in April about Highworth’s Co-op. I was shocked by the surprising involvement by the council.

My husband works in Highworth and we often shop there. We have never encountered the problems mentioned and I must add that, if we had, we would have dealt with the store manager and certainly not the council!

Apart from the quality of the products, the staff are always helpful and kind and always have time for the customers, which is a rarity these days. After all, we are not robots and a little humanity goes a long way.

The Co-op is very much the heart of Highworth.

Beatrice S, Swindon

Children are the victims

Chris Gleed and Roger Lack wrote to bemoan the effect of “made up conditions” in schools.

While I sympathise with their opposition to the medicalisation of behavioural issues they are way off with their own “made up” diagnosis; that the whole issue is about “do gooders” letting children express themselves too much.

Personally, I’ve always found it odd when conservatives oppose doing good in the name of their social sadist philosophy, but that’s by the by.

There is well documented evidence that the current regime of highly formalised, highly over-tested age inappropriate methods forced on our schools by successive governments is causing mental distress for large numbers of our children.

Austerity, child poverty and increasing inequality too is having a corrosive effect. It is hardly surprising that when nearly half of primary school children are told they are not up to scratch that some of them will look for other ways to find some sense of self-worth and “play up”.

It is cheaper if children are the problem rather than the system, and more profitable if the diagnosed ADHD epidemic, which spread from the USA, driven by pharmaceutical companies, can be dealt with through medication. One US study answered sceptics by saying the condition was real. It was funded by a company which markets one of the drugs and one of its authors was its medical director.

Peter Smith, Woodside Avenue, Swindon