LETTERS

Gullible guarantors

Given the level of complaints about payday loans, i’m surprised there hasn’t been more reaction to the apparently growing trend to advertise loans that require a guarantor.

in my time in a solicitor’s office, i lost count of how many people came in, astonished that they were being asked to pay a loan for which they had agreed to be a guarantor. They clearly had no idea what this entailed.

i wonder how many such loans are being given out after nan or Mum has been asked by a feckless relative to guarantee them, leaving those innocent parties either to take on the liability or fall out with their relative.

in this way, of course, the lending institution gets its loan repaid by a reliable person. it’s time this was reviewed by the relevant authorities.

TOM JOHNSTONE, Bradford, Yorks.

Tax disc tip

My wife and i own two modern runabouts and a restored classic car, and like most car owners we relied on windscreen discs to remind us when tax had to be renewed.

no doubt intentionally, the withdrawal of the tax disc has resulted in a DvLA frenzy of clamping, towing and extortionate vehicle storage fees because owners have no ready reminder of when to renew their tax.

There is a defence: all three of our vehicles have a tax disc showing the correct expiry date. These are perfectly produced replicas, cheaply and easily obtainable on the internet.

when the display of an official tax disc was a legal requirement, it was a criminal offence to fail to display one or to display a forged or altered one or a so-called ‘colourable imitation’.

But you can’t be prosecuted for displaying a replica of something that no longer exists.

NOEL A. SHAW, Bradford, Yorks.

Bomb folly

Can any MP who supports the bombing of Syria tell me how doing so will protect this country?

There is no bomb precise enough to kill only combatants, and each civilian killed creates new recruits for iSiS and more hatred of the west. i can’t see any correlation between dropping bombs in Syria and preventing terrorism in Britain, despite what the ‘gung ho’ types claim.

Bombing has been going on for some time: did that prevent the act of terror in france? i can see no rational reason to support bombing.

Mrs PATRICIA PARKIN, Sheffield.

Pandering to Palestine

fAr from the Palestinians having ‘few champions’ (Letters), virtually the whole world seems to support their cause. Anti-Semitism is on the rise, the anti-israel BDS campaign is gathering momentum, and neither europe nor the Un is very friendly towards israel.

israel has given up Jericho, Hebron, Bethlehem and Gaza for the sake of peace, but peace hasn’t come — quite the opposite. The reason, of course, is that Jerusalem is the real prize.

for me, the biggest obstacle to peace is that the Palestinian leadership still refuses to acknowledge israel’s right to exist.

There were no such people as the Palestinians until the late Sixties under yasser Arafat. Until then, the term ‘Palestine’ was used exclusively for Jewish organisations.

The Palestinian leadership should shoulder most of the blame for the failure of peace talks because they teach their children and young people to hate the Jewish people.

The many benefits israeli Arabs enjoy in israel could be shared by the Palestinians if only they changed their mantra: ‘you love life, we love death.’

Rev MERVYN TILLEY, Romford, Essex.

Ban the bagel

PC SiLLineSS over yoga and sombreros (Mail) could also be applied to the bagel, a quintessentially Jewish food with deep roots in Jewish culture.

During one episode in the 1,000-year history of oppression and killing of Jews by european gentiles, Jews were forbidden to bake bread. As an alternative, they simply boiled the dough — and that was the bagel.

So for gentiles to eat bagels is clearly ‘cultural appropriation’ and antiSemitic racism.

The same could be said of chicken. At the end of the 19th century and before world war i, Jewish immigration to Britain was considered a serious problem, and one of the many objections to Jews was that they ate chicken, which apparently most englishmen did not.

The fact that many people found this offensive is included in the 1904 report of the royal Commission on Aliens, which is what immigrants were then called. So anyone who is PC should refrain from eating chicken.

Dr L. B. SOKOLIC, London NW11.

Peaceful Islam

Are mosques radicalising young people? Here in Bradford we have 10,000 children daily attending supplementary schools in more than 100 islamic institutions.

The community has been operating mosques and madaris in Bradford for more than 50 years without government intervention. yes, it’s true we could be more inclusive — but in this we’re no different from British society as a whole.

Over the years we have struggled with child abuse and governance can also be an issue, but those are problems we also share with other British institutions.

Do we have a radicalisation problem? no more than in schools, universities and places of work. Some people think we teach hatred and division within our institutions — come and see for yourselves. Our places of worship are open to everyone.

Muslims have a duty to this country as British citizens and must play their part to ensure we remain safe and don’t allow what happened in Paris to happen on our shores.

islam teaches tolerance and peace. The extremist ideology that gave rise to the events in Paris is rooted in political and economic scenarios which have no place in islam.

British Muslims don’t associate themselves with the killing of people anywhere and shouldn’t be punished for the actions of a few.

ZULFI KARIM, Council for Mosques, Bradford.

No time for Nimbys

Here’S an idea: the Government should instruct the gas distributors to cut off supplies to the residents of roseacre and Little Plumpton, and to Lancashire County Council, who have succeeded in stopped fracking in their area.

i’m sick of all these village nimbys and their ‘not near me’ whines over motorways and railways. you can bet your bottom dollar they use them next to someone else’s home.

STEPHEN BIRDS, Bury, Lancs.

Malaria mystery

wHen i was studying for my pharmacy degree 37 years ago, our lecturer told us the anti- malaria drug Lariam ( Mail) could have severe side- effects including hallucinations, sleep disturbances, suicidal thoughts and psychosis.

we were told the long-term mental effects were not yet known, so an alternative should be prescribed if possible. if these side- effects were known in 1978, why is it still being given to our Armed forces?

JULIE WRIGHT, Darlington.

Not so traitorous

The way in which German nationals in Britain in world war ii were taken prisoner and interned certainly contrasts with today’s ‘enemy within’.

My grandfather moved here from Germany at the start of the 20th century and worked in yorkshire. He took his young family back to Germany during world war i but returned when it was over.

My grandmother and father were British citizens, but my grandfather never applied for citizenship and was arrested as world war ii got under way and taken to an internment camp on the isle of Man, along with 734 italians and 479 other Germans.

in July 1940, all internees were on the Arandora Star, being sent to Canada, when it was torpedoed by a German U-boat off Co Donegal and sank. My grandfather was one of those who perished. My grandmother received a letter saying he was ‘thought’ to have drowned. And that was that.

Those internees were all innocent,

running businesses and paying taxes in this country. My grandfather never broke the law. He worked as a butcher, with his own shop in Keighley.

My father won a grammar school scholarship and could speak four languages by the age of nine. In World War II he was drafted into the Intelligence Corps as an interpreter but had his identity card marked for fear he was a traitor and was watched carefully. He, too, died in his early 50s.

When I think of him and of the grandfather I never knew, I’m amazed to read about the treachery of some other immigrants to this country, with no reaction by the authorities.

Mrs JENNIFER LUND, Doncaster, South Yorks.

Our unelected rulers

VIRTuALLy everything affecting our lives is controlled by the European Commission, made up of 28 members (one for each country). Twelve have a special responsibility, while the remaining 16 (of which one is the uK representative) have no power and are simply there to make up the numbers.

We have no say as to who these people are because they’re appointed for a fiveyear period by some magical process. Nor can we have any hand in removing them, as they’re appointed, not elected.

The current 12 commissioners with real power are: President Jean- Claude Juncker; High Representative Frederica Mogherini; First Vice President Frans Timmermans; Vice Presidents Kristalina Georgieva, Andrus Ansip, Maros Sefcovic, Valdis Dombrovskis and Jyrki Katainen. Gunther Oettinger, Cecilia Maimstrom, Johannes Hahn and Neven Mimica make up the 12 with powers.

There’s not one british name among them — yet these 12 can tell us what we can and cannot do, say and think. The Eu is totally anti- democratic. How many national votes have been ignored because they were not what the Eu wanted? Are you happy that unelected foreigners control our country?

If you believe that democratically elected britons should run britain from our houses of Parliament, then you have a solution: when it arrives, vote No in the referendum. MALCOLM BOUCHIER,

Louth, Lincs.