How petty to ban our Christian charity...

OPERATION Christmas Child, the send- a- toy charity which has been banned by Inland Revenue bosses because of its Christian links ( Mail), started in Wrexham. We’re very proud of Dave Cooke who started this movement.

I suggest that David Varney, who banned Revenue workers from promoting this shoebox collection on his HM Revenue and Customs premises, reads Love In A Box, the story of how it all began. What has become of his love and compassion?

Operation Christmas Child is linked to Samaritan’s Purse. This is not, as David Varney seems to think, to promote Christianity, but to enable the shoeboxes to reach more children.

There is no enforced Christian teaching directed at anyone, either those who give or receive the boxes. It’s all done in love.

In the past, like many other volunteers, I’ve helped to check the boxes. Hundreds of businesses throughout the country allow their premises to be used as collecting points and, where appropriate, donate their own products to help fill the boxes. Many give employees time off to distribute boxes, sometimes in churches but more often in schools and orphanages. A spokesman for the Inland Revenue says: ‘ We have very clear workplace policies regarding the importance of valuing difference.’

If he ‘ values’ the difference between how his employees live and how the children who receive these boxes live, all I can say is thank God I’m a Christian who is prepared to do something about that difference and show children they are loved and valued, whatever their creed or faith.

SHIRLEY WALE, Wrexham. LET’S face it, scores of excuses are used by people to justify not giving to charity, and the supposed connection to Christianity of Samaritan’s Purse is just another such mean- minded excuse. There is one good reason for giving: sheer open-hearted generosity.

Mrs P. BARLOW, London E8.

Troops deserve support

FURTHER to the betrayal of our fighting forces ( Mail), where, in all this, is Her Majesty’s Opposition? There was a time when the Conservative Party would be proud to stand up and shout for the Armed Services. Its silence over the travesty of justice dispensed to our troops in Iraq is deafening.

Conservatives who should be calling for an emergency debate are too busy indulging in yet another episode of Find A Leader. Do internal party problems come before the morale and welfare of our men and women fighting wars on our behalf? Will we have to wait until after an election is called before David Cameron tells us his policy on our Armed Forces?

Also worrying is the silence of the Trades Union Congress. Our soldiers are workers who, in this 21st century, are denied proper representation. They have no one to speak for them on matters of welfare and efficiency.

Other EU countries allow servicemen and woman to belong to unions: why are ours ignored by the TUC?

ALAN EASTWOOD, Hartland, Devon.

Call this justice?

I’M APPALLED at the conduct of Attorney General Lord Goldsmith in letting seven members of the Parachute Regiment be put on trial on a trumped- up charge of unlawful killing (Mail).

There was not a scrap of evidence, apart from the unreliable allegations of several Iraqis who clearly saw their chance of making some money from the British taxpayer. As if our military personnel serving in Iraq didn’t have enough to put up with as a result of this unlawful war.

The excellent professionalism and common sense displayed by the Judge Advocate General Jeff Blackett, presiding over the courts martial was brilliant and commendable.

The mental stress caused to these seven men must have been tremendous and will probably affect them for the rest of their lives.

H. W. PHILLIPS, Ilford, Essex.

No Potter magic

AS A Harry Potter fan, I decided to go to the world premiere at Leicester Square to see the stars arrive. My mum, who has arthritis, decided to come along, too.

I’d never been to an event such as this before, and what I thought would be magical turned into a nightmare.

We got there at 10.30am and managed to get fairly near the front of the waiting crowd. The weather wasn’t kind and we got drenched, but we were prepared for that. What we weren’t prepared for was the ill manners of some people — the pushing, shoving and threats.

We stuck it out until 3.20pm, three hours before the stars arrived. We left very disappointed and wet and with my opinion of people at rock bottom. There was none of the magic or camaraderie I’d expected.

TINA CANHAM, Ipswich, Suffolk.

Blair’s next move

TONY BLAIR has only to continue ducking and diving for another 15 months and everything will work out fine for him. If he can avoid a referendum for that time, his New Labour

Government ( which doesn’t believe in democracy) will be free to vote ‘Yes’ and the European Constitution will become law.

With the constitution in place, in 2007 the EU will become a superstate — and a superstate needs a president.

It just happens that Tony is thinking of handing over to Gordon in 2007, leaving himself free to become President Blair, leader of the strongest nation on earth. If only he can duck and dive for another 15 months.

JOHN HALLETT,

Bath, Somerset.

Bald-faced

THE bald Eagle was adopted as the national emblem of the U.S. in 1782. However, its scavenging habits and timid disposition did not endear it to everyone. Benjamin Franklin deplored his country’s symbol for its ‘ bad moral character’. How prophetic those words have become. If you were an African slave or a Native American, you would probably have said that it was more vulture than eagle.

If you lived in Central America or Vietnam in the Sixties and Seventies, you would have said the same when millions fell victim to U.S. aggression. And now the U.S. vulture is gorging itself on the carcass of Iraqi oil. And to our everlasting shame, Britain is a hungry coyote helping itself to the scraps.

NORMAN WATSON,

Gwaenysgor, Flintshire.

Smoking’s legacy

I’M GLAD Charles Farrow is alive at 86 years and still smoking ( Letters). My lovely husband, David, also smoked but gave it up after two heart attacks.

He recovered but eventually succumbed to lung cancer and a brain tumour. He died at 57.

He admitted in his last months that smoking was to blame. Most of us know an ‘ Old Bert’ who smoked 60 a day and lived to 90, but for every one of those, many more die needlessly.

LINDA ARCHER,

Buntingford, Herts.

Down the drain?

MY 21-year-old grandson had a similar problem with a place at college, but no plumbing apprenticeship (Mail).

All the family were trying to think of ways to help and were getting desperate. Then one day, I spotted a plumber’s van drawing up, steeled myself and approached the man to see if he could help. He turned out to be the manager of a family plumbing firm who quickly quizzed me on my grandson’s age, GCSEs and driving qualifications. The upshot was that my grandson got a job. So my advice is to try the personal approach, and don’t give up.

A. BRUCE, London SW12.

Dangers of fluoride

ONLY three-quarters of public water supplies in the Irish Republic, not all as claimed by Prof Lennon ( Letters), are fluoridated. Nevertheless, since 1984 there has been a sevenfold increase in fluoride poisoning ( dental fluorosis) of 15- yearolds — four children in ten are now affected by this indiscriminate practice.

This is probably one of the many reasons why Sheffield’s councillors voted by 54 to 17 to reject the arguments put to them in February by Sheffield University’s Prof Lennon.

They, like us, do not want fluoride in drinking water. A prophet often lacks honour in his own land, but the message of this professor and chairman of the British Fluoridation Society is not wellreceived in other places, either.

When the health authorities in Northern Ireland attempted to introduce fluoridation in 1996-7, 25 of Northern Ireland’s councils voted no — including a rare example of agreement by Dr Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams.

Coca Cola is closing down its bottling operation in Dublin and transferring it to a new plant in Co Antrim, in Northern Ireland, which will use unfluoridated water. It seems to have learnt the lesson of Dasani and Sidcup town water.

Guinness brewed in Dublin contains six times more fluoride than that brewed in London. This is added at the treatment plant since it’s not found in natural Liffey water.

ROBERT POCOCK,

Irish Concern for the

Environment, Dublin.

Come here often?

THE WORST chat- up line ( Mail) I ever delivered — though I didn’t intend it as such — was: ‘You look very much like my late wife.’

The worst one ever addressed to me was: ‘ Would you like to see my mastectomy scar?’

JOHN WARD,

Brislington, Bristol. ON AUGUST 26, 1976, I was sitting in an expat bar in Doha, Qatar, chatting to an old friend when I felt a hand on my shoulder from behind and a woman’s sexy voice asked me to pass over her handbag.

Without turning to look at her, I said: ‘If you do that again I’ll buy you the drink of your choice.’

I got a brief massage on each shoulder and bought the lady a gin and tonic. We were engaged 18 days later and married three months after that.

We did get divorced in 1995, but remarried in 2000. We have two daughters, three grandsons and an apartment in Spain and are looking forward to moving there.

IAN STEWART,

Canterbury, Kent.

Bonfire Night hell

BONFIRE Night should be renamed Firework Hell Night. Nobody has bonfires or guys any more in the true tradition of Guy Fawkes, but everyone seems to feel it is necessary to mark the evening with their own firework display.

I live on a modern housing estate where most of the properties are ‘ executive homes’, but are still condensed housing where everyone has relatively small gardens.

This year, Bonfire Night started at 5.15pm with incessant fireworks until 10.50pm and a finale at 12.15am. It felt as if every household on the estate was setting off the loudest fireworks they could find.

I don’t want to be a killjoy and I enjoy a good display, but it seems to have gone over the top.

I have a 14- month- old child who was scared of the loud bangs. Goodness knows how any young child is expected to sleep through such a bombardment of noise — and I pity anyone with cats or dogs. No doubt we will have to endure it all again in less than two months’ time when the same people will probably feel unable to see in the New Year without a personal firework display, regardless of the impact on their neighbours.

I suppose it’s just a symptom of our increasingly selfish society.

MELANIE ALLCHIN,

Northampton.