Letters: June 9, 2016

Anonymity is granted only at the discretion of the editor, who also reserves the right to edit letters.

Highly wrong ban

I WOULD like to comment on Robert Buckland’s column in the SA this week, about the banning of legal highs.

While I feel that the government is to be congratulated on the attempt I am afraid that they have got it wrong, as is often the case with hasty legislation.

In an understandable attempt to enact a catch-all law they have potentially made every garden centre and seed merchant in the land law breakers.

The following is a list of plants and seeds with psychoactive properties, all of them common in garden centres and seed catalogues.

Morning glory – if the seeds of this plant are ground up and sniffed it has an effect similar to LSD.

Datura is a pleasant, even beautiful, greenhouse shrub that can be planted out in the summer, it is common in garden centres and parks. If the flower is sniffed it gives one a feeling of otherworldliness. The saying goes in its homeland, that if you go to sleep under a tree of this species you wake up dead.

Henbane is an extremely poisonous plant so strong in psychoactive substances that holding a leaf between your hands causes you to have the sensation of flying, overdoing it leads to unconsciousness and death.

The opium poppy is readily available in garden centres, seed catalogues and supermarkets; once grown it is simple to get raw opium.

The liquidamber tree produces a resin that the Aztec emperors used to go into a trance; this tree is for sale in garden centres, there is even one growing in Queens Park that I planted myself.

These are a few of the plants that I have become aware of in a lifelong career as a gardener and there must be more that I do not know of.

When this law was proposed I wrote to my MP to warn of this, but apparently this was not taken into consideration.

May I seek assurance from Robert, as the solicitor general, that prosecutions will not be faced by gardeners, garden centres and seed merchants who grow and sell these plants?

STEVE THOMPSON

Norman Road

Swindon

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Anti-EU rhetoric

WITH not long to go the referendum campaign leaves much to be desired, however at least we know what the future holds if we vote to stay. We have after all been members for more than four decades and therefore have a clear idea of what to expect. However to date no clear case has been put forward by the quitters and there are two things they must now do without further delay if the British people are to be able to make an informed choice.

1. Explain in a clear manner exactly how quitting will benefit us.

2. Explain exactly what the plan is should we quit.

To date they have simply failed to do either. All they have come out with is anti-EU rhetoric which is not in itself an argument showing the benefits to us of quitting, yet they ask us to make a very profound change to the way in which we do things that most economists and world leaders seem to think carries grave risks.

Unless they can provide both, why should we support them and vote to leave?

ADAM POOLE

Savill Crescent

Wroughton

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Humans are spiritual

I FIRMLY believe that as well as all human beings being creatures of flesh and blood, they are also spiritual beings regardless of their religious convictions, or their otherwise perhaps-atheist choice of no beliefs. Regarding the charade and nonsense that is going on regarding the referendum, my vote has been cast. Postal for the first time in my life, as I will not be in Swindon on the day of destiny for our nation.

On that basis and firm belief, I believe that regardless of the outcome of the referendum, David Cameron for all his inherited wealth will never again have a good night’s sleep – because of the remarks he made about the war dead, many of my flesh and blood. Regarding his remarks about their efforts, and loss of life.To accept the subjugation of Britain to a European Disunion dominated by Germany, when their intentions were the exact opposite.

I also doubt that Mr Blair for all his accumulated wealth through abuse of his resigned position has had a good night’s sleep either for a long time. Make no mistake about it, the day of reckoning comes to us all. This life is brief regarding our planet and the cosmos. I do not look forward to the point when my time comes. But I believe I will have less apprehension than the previous two aforementioned.

BILL WILLIAMS

Merlin Way

Covingham, Swindon

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10 million immigrants

EXPERTS (city analysts) predict that over the next 10 years, 10 million immigrants will enter the UK, in addition to natural population growth of four million.

This will have drastic knock-on effects across an already-overcrowded country.

Britain and Europe are not just dealing with Syria’s civil war but also the fact Africa continues to undergo a population explosion.

The continent’s population growth looks set to double over the next decade or so to 2.2billion. This will result in a migration exodus.

The trend also implies it is inevitable that within the near future the already-buckling and highly-stressed state services will break under sheer numbers.

Europe also by the mid-century is going to have hundreds of millions from Africa and the Middle East.

There’ll be no more Europe as we know it. In democracies, mass immigration is also political takeover. We’ll have a highly Islamicised Europe.

The government will be forced to introduce unprecedented measures such as cordoning off pockets of southern England into self-contained migrant camps. At first it will be tens of thousands (the usual government propaganda: ‘there won’t be many coming here and just temporary’ ) to ultimately hundreds of thousands settling in permanent migrant camps with all that that entails.

Cameron lacks the political will to solve the crisis. He is so paralysed by the dogma of multi-culturalism.

On top of this we have the anarchy in Calais.

JEFF ADAMS

Bloomsbury

Swindon

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Too many taxis

THE EU is now pushing for the expansion of Uber Taxis and this is flooding the roads in Britain with too many taxis. These additional cars on the road are making it hard for existing drivers to earn a living and it is grinding down the wages of the working class.

It should be up to the British government to decide on this issue.

It should not be the unelected commissioners in Brussels that decide how many taxis we should have on the roads in Britain.

STEVE HALDEN

Beaufort Green

Swindon

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Donkey leaders

DESPITE all the claims and counterclaims, surely the referendum issue comes down to just one thing: Do we want to be led by EU donkeys or do we want to be led by UK donkeys?

THAD LORING-LEE

Wheatstone Road

Swindon

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More care for infants

NOT enough is being done to ensure that babies and young children in care grow up in positive, nurturing settings.

At present, mental health services for babies and infants in care are virtually non-existent. In a new report, Case for Change, the NSPCC says the impact of infant mental health has been vastly under-estimated across the wider care system.

Children in care are four times more likely than their peers to experience mental health problems and behavioural issues in later life.

Through the formation of secure and stable relationships with their parents and care-givers, children are more likely to grow up not experiencing serious mental health difficulties.

But 20% of children in care in England are under five years old. And between 2010-11 and 2015-16, there was a 31% fall in spending by local authorities on early intervention services for children and young people.

The NSPCC’s ‘Case for Change’ brings together a wide range of research and practice from the UK and internationally and suggests how we must rethink our approach to infant mental health in the care system. The report indicates that there is hope of recovery for infants and young children in care. But it needs to happen during infancy when a baby’s brain is developing at a rapid rate.

The NSPCC’s ‘Case for Change’ is being launched during the UK’s first Infant Mental Health Week, organised by the Parent Infant Partnership (PIP UK).

Acting early can have significant benefits to future life outcomes. Yet public money is mostly spent on ‘late intervention’, rather than preventing problems occurring in the first place. It is time to rethink the way we work together across agencies to better identify and address the mental health and well-being needs of infants and young children.

SHARON COPSEY

NSPCC Regional Head of Service for South West England