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Dumbing down

I AM devastated! On Thursday night, Question Time came from Oxford. One would assume that as one of our premier university cities it would be peopled by a reasonably intelligent audience. How wrong can I be? There were so many people in the audience who couldn’t put a sentence together, I was amazed.

As for the panel. Well we had a complete bunch of No Hopers from just about every potential political party in the country. I say No Hopers advisedly as I certainly hadn’t ever heard of any of them.

There was a young lady representing the Lib Dems who tried throughout the programme to talk over everyone else on the panel and also the audience as well.

Not only was the show peopled by illiterates, it was also full of people with no manners. They were all rambling on about things that had no bearing on questions under discussion. Some were complaining about the fact that Theresa May was not elected as Prime Minister. Prime Ministers are never elected by the public.

And of course we had Dimbleby rabbiting on and interrupting as though he was the most important person on the programme. He is not.

This panel and audience was dragging the referendum out all the time. Its over, done, learn to live with it. The criticism of Theresa May was totally unbelievable. No she is not perfect. Is anyone?

But it shows the quality of the audience. They would have been happier if Tony Blair was standing again. Do we really want politicians of his type back in power?

The main point that came out of this discussion was a very simple fact. We need to direct much more money to education. Because the audience certainly needed it.

And before I forget, were the audience only that bad because they were picked by the production team? They must have been as I have never come across so many dumbos in all my life.

DAVID COLLINS, Blake Crescent, Swindon

Well done, Chris

CHRIS Packham, who visited Malta to complain about the killing of all the birds that arrive, used quotes from the Bible to complain about his actions in a different country to his own.

Christians have often visited other countries to speak against injustice and cruelty to animals, children etc, also slavery. Some were founded by governments, beaten and killed. What they did was often against the laws of this country.

This is how we became a Christian civilisation. It is in the teaching and example of Jesus Christ they did these things. We need people like that today.

REV HW JONES, Summerhouse Road, Wroughton

No pride in town

UNTIL the list of councillors appeared in the Swindon Advertiser Wednesday 28th April for the parish councillors, we hadn’t heard very much about it at all, apart from seeing we would have to pay £80 odd on top of our council tax.

In the paper, it was stated that the parish tax will pay for low level graffiti, fly tipping, grounds and play area maintenance and litter bin emptying. So I would like to know what this council are spending our council tax on if the parishes are taking on all of the above.

So perhaps we will get some repairs done on the roads and potholes filled in but I won’t hold my breath.

And how about making anybody who has a community service against them to go out picking up rubbish because Swindon is getting to be a rubbish tip. Nobody seems to take pride in their town any more.

MRS TOWNSEND, Redcliffe Street ,Rodbourne, Swindon

It can’t get any worse

IT was reported in some sections of the media last week that the Trussell Trust Charity had given away a record 1.2 million food parcels between April 2016 and March 2017.

Add these statistics to the ongoing crisis in the NHS, record numbers of people living and sleeping on the streets of the UK each night, police stations, fire station, A&E units, family centres, libraries closing across the country, bus services being scrapped, vulnerable people taking their own lives due to benefit cuts and changes to the benefit system and public sector workers having their pay capped at 1%.

All this is occurring in the name of Tory austerity. Is it any surprise that Theresa May won’t appear in any televised debates and in her travels across the country will see her only address selected audiences.

How much worse do things have to become before the voters realise what a cruel callous lot the Tories are? We have an opportunity on June 8 to vote them out, waste this chance and the country will suffer five more years of chaos and destruction at the hands of the Tory austerity.

MARTIN WEBB, Swindon Road, Old Town

A duty to the young

ENGAGING young people in mainstream politics is a bit of a vicious circle.

Many young people are - at best - turned off from modern politics or - at worst - alienated by it.

Some politicians can, in turn, disregard young people’s needs as they are less likely to vote. And so the cycle continues.

But are young people politically apathetic? I don’t think they are. It’s true that fewer 18 to 24-year-olds may be turning out to vote than their older counterparts but there is evidence to show that they are more engaged in other ways.

With yet another national vote looming, young people have another chance to influence national politics. In fact 750,000 British teenagers who were too young to vote in the referendum last year will have their first opportunity to vote on June 8 and it’s vital they don’t miss this chance to make a difference.

In the children’s sector we need to use our contact with young people to emphasise how important political engagement could be in changing lives.

At Barnardo’s we’re heading in the right direction, helping young people to tell their stories and share their experiences to influence politicians and decision-makers.

We also support the lowering of the voting age to 16 in Westminster elections to ensure greater representation of children and young people at a national level.

Politicians need to do more to bring young people into the political mainstream so they can have a say in key issues that affect them.

Large-scale opting out by a whole section of society is not a sign of a healthy, representative democracy.

HUGH SHERRIFFE, Barnardo’s regional director

Stop the rats!

THIS morning at 08:15 I decided to make a quick dash to my local Co-op in Hyde Road. Living as I do in the relatively quiet “Car and White Van Park” side of Queensfield, I was quite unprepared for the mini motorway conditions I met as I rounded the south west corner of the estate.

The whole of the northern branch of Queensfield was nose to tail with running rats avoiding the Moonraker car trap - sorry roundabout - and there was a queue stuck at the Hyde Road junction because of vehicles queueing at the Kingsdown traffic lights.

Mixed up in all this were children of all ages both walking and cycling, some of the latter using the pavement presumably for their own safety!

When I returned, the northern arm of the estate was a little less crowded but many of the rats appeared to be driving, if not at an illegal speed, most certainly at an unwise one.

It has got to stop. All that rubbish about the wonderful urban village living in Swindon should not be at the expense of those of us who are already here and as in my case, have worked and lived here for many many years.

In any future elections I shall be voting only for a candidate who is brave enough to say they have intent and a strategy to stop the Queensfield rat runners.

How? Not my problem politicians!

TERRY FLINDERS, Swindon