Housing plans show we’re going to the dogs
REGARDING the possible closure of Belle Vue greyhound stadium
(M.E.N., December 17), I’m absolutely shocked at the recommendation of planning permission.
Watching these beautiful dogs speed around the track is so exciting and enjoyed by so many people.
Visitors I have seen in the past have been from Germany, Holland, Finland and many more from around the country who combine this with football matches and theatres, etc. Adult special needs people and uni students also visit regularly.
Most large cities provide greyhound racing and Manchester would be culturally poorer without it.
Belle vue is also used for stock cars, motor cycle training, fairgrounds and provides employment for many people.
If this is passed by Labour councillors it will confirm that they are on the side of property speculators making millions and not the working class who enjoy an inexpensive night out.
Note that most of these houses are not affordable for people in the area and will put even more pressure on schools, doctors and the already congested and unhealthy roads.
If Manchester wants a green environment, building in this area should not be allowed but developed as a entertainment hub alongside speedway and basketball, etc. Frank Billington, via email
If you want a say, vote!
REGARDING the article in the M.E.N. about the voting figures in favour of removing and replacing trees with young saplings on Homelands Road in Sale.
Some protesters seem to have a misunderstanding of what constitutes a majority.
The figure for people consulted: 43.
Number who replied: 24. Number in favour: 17. Number against: seven. Everybody was given the same voting details, including the closing date.
So the opinion of the 24 people who replied in time are the only votes that count and, therefore, there was a majority.
The 19 people who did not vote, for whatever reason, do not have any say in the matter.
They had their chance, but did not take it.
As the saying goes, ‘if you don’t buy a ticket, you can’t expect to win the raffle.’ C.F., name and address supplied
Ha’pennies from heaven
WHEN I was a youngster in Clayton in the 1950s and 60s we used to play shove ha’penny football.
Two well-worn pennies and an ha’penny, a flat table top and a small comb each and we were away.
The goals were two pennies apart at either end (and there was no VAR) marked with a pencil or a bit of chalk.
When I was in the printing trade there would be lunchtime games played on ‘the stone,’ a big flat piece of ground steel up to four feet by three feet, used for locking up type into the chaise, old word for an old craft, gone now mostly.
I wonder if shove ha’penny is still played anywhere.
I was a totally useless football player but I played a mean game of shove ha’penny.
I was unbeatable.
There’s a challenge. Philip Lowe, Penrith
Workers held in contempt
LIKE other working-class Northerners, I am acutely aware of the liberal elite’s contempt.
Nevertheless, in the recent election we showed why British democracy remains the envy of free peoples everywhere.
Despite the establishment plot of the last three years to subvert democracy, we, the bedrock of this country, retain our true instinct for all that is best about Britain.
That instinct rejects an alien ideology which has brought death, enslavement and poverty to all it has afflicted. It repudiates a leader who so hates this country that he always sides with our enemies, whether convicted terrorists or hostile states. It scorns the cancer anti-Semitism, to defeat which many of our ancestors gave their lives and which yet threatens our Jewish neighbours, our fellow Mancunians.
It laughs at those who shamefully try to bribe us with our own money. It scoffs at ‘woke’ derangement and all its imagined grievances.
It detests the politics of hatred which demonises ambition and vilifies those who provide jobs and taxes without which there would be no welfare state.
It strikes back at a sneering metropolitan elite whose contempt for working people is such that it glibly ignored the votes of the 17.4 million who want an independent democracy answerable to the British people.
It distains the arrogant clique of media and entertainment luvvies and academic drones whose distain for working people is matched only by their ignorance of the real world.
For this, the country owes us a great debt. As the Chief Rabbi said, we have saved the country’s soul. Joseph O’Neill, via email