Your letters...

Don’t shoot messenger

Editor, — Further to your report on my talk to the Henley Society (Standard, October 1), I am pleased to have stimulated debate on the concerning matter of the shortage of affordable housing for rent and purchase in Henley.

It has been most interesting to hear the views of many people on the subject and it does seem that the need for more affordable houses is agreed by the vast majority.

I should also set the record straight on some misconceptions and inaccuracies contained within those views.

Firstly, Highlands Park is currently in the process of constructing more than 70 affordable homes, many of which are already completed and occupied.

These homes amount to more than 90 per cent of the affordable housing built in Henley over the last few years.

They are administered by the South Oxfordshire Housing Association and provide opportunities for both social and affordable rental plus affordable routes to homeownership.

In addition, the section 106 payments and the Community Infrastructure Levy (effectively charges on development) paid to the local councils and amounting to several millions of pounds have enabled South Oxfordshire District Council to assist local housing associations to build more affordable homes, finance improvements to our infrastructure and provide support to our public transport system.

Secondly, I am definitely from the generation born shortly after the war.

Many of us have benefited enormously from escalating property values and the excellent right to buy scheme introduced in the Eighties.

However, the sale of these houses has created a problem in that the social housing element once sold was never replaced, creating a shortage of affordable homes in Henley.

My research showed clearly that there was a reduction in the number of younger people in Henley and a major increase in residents of an older age (70-plus), a divergence which is growing, and confirmed my thoughts of some years ago. Figures from the district council confirmed this view.

There is a need for more affordable housing and, in addition, some further lower price accommodation for those just starting out.

It is good sport to shoot the messenger but it doesn’t resolve the problem.

My talk was also as much about change and managing change as we must plan for the future.

Maybe we cannot achieve all we may wish for our youngsters and key workers but we can keep an open mind and constructively try to plan for our fabulous town’s future. — Yours faithfully,

Alan Pontin

Henley

Good effort to level up

Sir, — I write in response to Emma Levy’s letter criticising the laudable aims of Councillor Jo Robb and others at South Oxfordshire District Council in supporting affordable housing (Standard, October 22).

Ms Levy agrees that the council is funding the building of some social housing in Grey Green through section 106 payments, then adds: “Where does she think these payments come from?”

At its most simple, the payments come from developers who are building housing for the wealthy to allow homes to be built for key workers and the like who cannot afford the normal cost of housing in the area.

Without such affordable housing and social housing schemes, the current chronic shortage of nurses, care workers, teachers and the like would be far worse.

So I for one am grateful for the work that the district council under its current leadership is doing to try to level up. — Yours faithfully,

Robert Jones

Manor Road, Goring

Good value car parks

Sir, — In reply to R Willcock’s letter (Standard, October 22), I think the Henley car park charges are about right.

The purpose of the free first hour is to encourage shoppers to visit the town, buy what they need and leave in order to use what limited parking space there is to maximum advantage, so that more people can shop easily.

The £1.20 charge for two hours is quite reasonable for convenient parking. If you park in Hills Meadow in Reading the cost is £3.10 for two hours, plus you have quite a walk into the town centre.

Other places in Britain are much more expensive. If you park in Hawkshead in the Lake District, for example, it costs £4. Seaside towns like Brighton charge even more.

Some years ago my wife and I, holidaying in Yorkshire, decided not to stop in Filey as the price of parking in season was £6.

Compared to a lot of other attractive towns, Henley still offers value for money. — Yours faithfully,

Adrian Vanheems

Baskerville Road, Sonning Common

New parking deal suits me

You cannot please all the people all the time and clearly the new parking arrangements in Henley’s main car parks do not please everybody but they do suit me.

I have lived in or close to Henley for just over 50 years and Waitrose is my corner shop.

I am a regular customer there and, with an organised shopping list, I can do a quick trip to the bank, the pharmacy, the hardware shop and Waitrose all comfortably inside one hour and then go home for a cup of coffee.

Should I require longer (for instance, a dental appointment), I am content to pay.

Compared with a lot of other local towns, the parking fees are not outrageous.

R Willcock is right in one respect — 18 coffee shops are too many. — Yours faithfully,

Ginny Batchelor-Smith

Lower Assendon

Protecting our children

The Government has rejected the proposal from the House of Lords to tighten the legal limits on particulate matter.

The World Health Organisation recently improved its targets with the comment that there is no safe limit.

We should be doing everything in our power in a timely manner to avoid the risk of asthma in children as it can lead to death.

Countries with no pollution, such as Finland, have no asthma in children.

In the UK during the coronavirus pandemic there were almost no new cases.

Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, from Lewisham, died in 2013 from severe asthma.

In June last year a coroner said that air pollution was a major factor in her death, which followed 28 visits to accident and emergency.

Experts say that she was the “canary in the coal mine” and that action should be taken.

Doing nothing should not be an option but that is what this Government, including John Howell, has decided to do.

Waiting until the end of 2022 will ensure an estimated further 24 deaths from children’s asthma.

It has also been established that covid-19 cases are more prevalent in high pollution areas.

Clean Air for Henley’s visits to primary schools gave us the impression that about 20 per cent of children have at least some use of an inhaler.

Thanks to Henley Residents Group councillors, with support from South Oxfordshire District Council, we have conducted particulate monitoring, the first in the county.

This project was done during the lockdowns, i.e. when the levels of traffic were low, so the initial results showed peaks but not sustained levels of particulate pollution. Given the new WHO guidelines, these results would be more significant.

However, traffic is returning to normal levels so pollution levels are rising again. It would be a good time to focus attention but it is seemingly being ignored.

My hopes had been high given the COP26 leadership opportunity.

On the other hand, I read that the new London ultra low emission zone roll-out is causing the abandonment of diesel cars at six times the rate of the UK, so hope remains.

Please continue to switch off your engines when parked in town. It seems we have to look after ourselves. — Yours faithfully,

David Dickie

Clean Air for Henley, St Katherine’s Road, Henley

Misinformed opinions

I am amazed that the Henley Standard is publishing misinformation in readers’ letters.

If I was to write that the world is flat I presume you would not print it because it’s not true, so why allow the climate change deniers the space you do?

So maybe the letter headlined “In the defence of coal” should have read “In defence of mass genocide of the global south”.

The letter headline “GP should know better” should have read “None of my statement below is true and can be debunked by any secondary school student”.

Finally, “Where are these floods?” could have read, “I’m all right, Jack, sod everyone else as I have not been flooded yet. Sorry about the floods in Germany but they don’t count”.

Please don’t give space to views that will continue to slow the changes we need to make. — Yours faithfully,

Justin Whelan

Henley

We owe world climate debt

Sir, — I was disappointed to see that some of your recent correspondents are still denying the effects of climate change and the urgent need to protect our environment.

I would say to them tell that to the people of the Solomon Islands who have lost some of their smaller islands due to the rise in sea level.

Or tell that to the people of Rwanda who have suffered irreparable loss and damage by long periods of drought followed by intense rainfall.

Likewise in Sierra Leone, where in 2017 huge mudslides killed nearly 1,000 people and displaced 3,000, not to mention the destruction of infrastructure, schools, hospitals, roads and bridges.

Countries such as these are desperate for nations across the world to take leadership on the issue of loss and damage.

It is the least developed countries of the world that need dedicated financial support to help address the profound and far-reaching damage and the deep, irreplaceable losses as a result of climate change.

We know that wealthy countries like the UK have done the most to cause the climate crisis and owe the rest of the world an immense “climate debt”.

It is for that reason many national and international charities and organisations, people of all faiths and none, from all walks of life from around the world are demanding climate justice for those countries suffering the worst effects of climate change.

To highlight this on Saturday, November 6, the mid-point in the COP26 summit, people all over Britain will be attending rallies and marches for a global day of action for climate justice.

We in Greener Henley will be joining with other groups and individuals at Friends Meeting House in Northfield End at 10.30am for a walk to the area in front of St Mary’s Church for 11am. There we will observe a respectful silence for our planet and all that dwell on it.

A photograph of the assembled crowd in front of Henley’s landmark church will be sent to our Prime Minister to show that we in Henley care and are expecting positive results and action from the conference.

If you are not going to one of the larger rallies in Oxford, London or Glasgow, please join us and encourage your friends and families to come too. For more information, email greenerhenley@gmail.com — Yours faithfully,

Diana Barnett

Greener Henley, St Katherine’s Road, Henley

Oxygen of opinion

Editor, — I write in response to Rob Jones’s letter headlined “Silence the deniers” (Standard, October 22).

Calling for the silencing of those who do not match or support your world view is abhorrently wrong.

Naturally, you would wish to silence this communication as I am one of those “deniers”.

It is my view that “climate deniers” is a derogatory term devised by a corrupted power structure to discredit and isolate those who have the intelligence to question the narrative and the agenda it evolves.

It is also my view that the problem with the climate and weather is that it is artificially induced to serve as very convincing catastrophic special effects when needed to further that global agenda.

Could Mr Jones confirm scientifically with data that what is seen to be climate change isn’t weather warfare, i.e artificial modification of our atmosphere by geo-engineering?

Would he also deny that cloud seeding is a long- established method for artificially inducing rainfall by dropping silver iodide (dry ice) into clouds?

It is also worth noting that many things can cause unnatural heating on Earth, including microwave technologies.

True science would not shut down alternative viewpoints or facts. Only agendas do that.

Ridding the planet of CO2 certainly would deprive climate deniers of oxygen as well as everyone else as it is the food of life for all that grows on Earth. — Yours faithfully

Mr N D Myer

Fir Tree Avenue, Wallingford

Don’t silence opponents

Sir, — I knew it would happen but had been delighted it was taking its time arriving.

Cancel culture has raised its ugly head in these pages in the form of a letter demanding you don’t publish views that the writer disagrees with (Standard, October 22).

Cancel culture is not a modern evil; we have seen it many times before throughout history.

It starts with someone saying so-and-so shouldn’t be allowed to say that, progresses through statue topplings and book burnings, heads on to the incarceration of journalists, authors, intellectuals, scientists and then everyone disagreed with, concentration camps and mass killings.

We’ve seen it all before. Every time, the instigators thought they were “the goodies”. Every time they turned out to be very much the evil “baddies”.

If you can’t convince people with your use of facts and logic, if you can’t create empathy with your views, then maybe your views need work.

You don’t resort to silencing those that disagree, you convince them with your argument.

If you can’t convince them then maybe you should review your own stance. Listen to their side, see where you and they are failing and work together to build higher.

You may notice that I have taken care not to name the person who made the outrageous demand in this fine paper. This is because I am giving them the benefit of the doubt.

They think they were being a goodie. They were actually being a baddie.

I am hoping that this letter helps them see the error of their ways. I couldn’t bear to see any more books being burned. — Yours faithfully,

Simon Brickhill

Goring Heath

Good and bad terrorists?

Sir, — There were two lethal terror attacks on that fateful Friday, October 15, both at places of worship.

The horrific execution of Tory MP Sir David Amess took place at a constituency surgery in a Methodist church.

In common with most people, Sir David hadn’t been on my radar and it is a tragic irony that he has now become universally known as a result of his untimely violent death.

Through extensive media coverage, I have now been informed about his age, family, religion and political beliefs.

There has been a plethora of encomia and fulsome praise for his dedication to public service and prayers were said at the Mayor of Henley’s civic service (Standard, October 22).

The other terror attack at a Shia mosque in Kandahar resulted in 50 deaths and 70 injured.

The media reports on this massacre were brief and matter of fact. Blink and you would have missed them.

Granted, Leigh-on-Sea and Kandahar are thousands of miles apart but the perpetrators in both cases were radical Islamist extremists and we have been told all along that there is a link between terrorism in Afghanistan and in the UK.

Other than numbers, we know nothing about the Kandahar victims, their families, lives and aspirations.

With British troops there fighting Islamists for 20 years and two centuries of military interventions, perhaps there should be more empathy with the victims of Islamist terror in that country as well.

Or is it a case of double standards, of good terrorists and bad terrorists? The right religion or the wrong religion? — Yours faithfully,

Alexis Alexander

Gosbrook Road, Caversham

Spread GP’s message

Sir, — I applaud Dr Will Hearsey’s excellent Apple a Day column (Standard, October 22).

Clear and concise communication has never been more important than it is now, especially in healthcare.

A bored-sounding voice on the Hart Surgery answerphone and one line on its website stating “We’re open for business” and “we care” doesn’t cut it.

Dr Hearsey’s column deserved to be on your front page and (Hart Surgery practice manager please note) should be emailed and/or texted to every patient registered at the Hart and Bell Surgeries.

We are so privileged in Henley to not only have the great teams at the surgeries but Townlands Memorial Hospital as well. One couldn’t ask for more.

Please get the message out there using every avenue. — Yours faithfully,

Steve Ludlow

Station Road, Henley

Wonderful doctors

Sir, — I would like to add my support for our wonderful hard-working GPs.

I have nothing but praise for the whole team at the Hart Surgery.

They are always respectful and understanding and should expect the same in return from their patients.

I am always impressed by the efficiency and smooth running of the surgery, even in difficult times.

The whole country has been under terrific strain during the coronavirus pandemic but we should all be kind and try to understand each other a little more. — Yours faithfully,

Janet Wise

War Memorial Place, Henley

NHS needs reforming

Sir, — With one hand taking a swipe at the Government’s “lamentable” performance in dealing with the covid-19 pandemic and, with the other, praising the medical practitioners, Ron White is covering his bets with the usual clichés, i.e. the medical staff are heroes but more money is needed (Standard, October 22).

For sure, we should be on level ground with the best in Europe with consultants per 100,000 of the population and equally with the number of CT and MRI scanners.

But just tipping ever more money into the system is not the answer. Supply creates demand.

What is needed is a real review of the NHS with changes as necessary to the budget allocation and system.

The NHS currently absorbs more than £210billion for England and Wales, including the £60billion covid allocation (source: the King’s Fund),

For starters, how many were aware of the numbers of management personnel who receive more than £200,000 a year as a salary, as recently highlighted?

This is a highly complex system, which needs more than annual demands for more “investment” because it is “in crisis”. — Yours faithfully,

William Fitzhugh

Caversham

Dismantling democracy

Behind a mop of hair and bad jokes, this Government is dismantling our democracy.

They are changing election rules to be even more biased in their favour. They are ensuring that they are judge, jury and commentator. It’s probably already too late for us to elect anyone else. Ever.

The Elections Bill is currently going through Parliament. As part of that, they are introducing voter ID at polling stations. That’s despite there being hardly any evidence of impersonator fraud.

Against that, there are estimates of up to two million people, including many vulnerable, who will not vote who would have done.

Further, the Bill means they will be able to criminalise “campaigning” up to a year before an election. Where this really matters is for campaigns “intended to achieve common purpose”.

With a divided Opposition and a first past the post election system, the Tories have won elections with as little as 37 per cent of the vote.

In 2019 there were 864,000 votes to elect the single Green MP, whereas it took just 38,000 to elect each Tory MP.

Our democracy was already unrepresentative but at least it was possible to vote out an incompetent, law-breaking and dishonest Government through alliances and tactical voting campaigns. Now that will be outlawed too.

They will also be judge and jury. The Government is going to put itself in charge of what the Electoral Commission can investigate. That’s the hitherto non-partisan body that is there to ensure that those competing in elections stick to the rules.

Meanwhile, the Home Office wishes to neuter the right to protest by criminalising very noisy or seriously annoying protests.

I believe the Government is also trying to ensure the courts can’t hold them to account. This includes neutering the Supreme Court and stopping campaign groups from taking them to court, for instance, to challenge them about their spending of our money on contracts awarded to their friends.

The media is already hugely biased in this Government’s favour but that’s not enough. It is gunning for the BBC and turning cartwheels to ensure its favoured Right-wing candidate gets the chair of the supposedly impartial regulator, Ofcom.

In the last 47 years, only one person has led a party to general election victory who was not a Conservative.

Soon, it will not be possible for anyone else to win. Like autocrats everywhere, they’ll still want to go through the motions of having elections but these will be meaningless.

In practice, we will be living in a one-party state. — Yours faithfully,

Robert Thompson

Henley

Roads will get worse...

Sir, — I fear that Victor Wilson is in for a steep learning curve on his afternoon drives (Standard, October 22).

No doubt he has encountered the summer visiting city dwellers who have no idea about the country code (single-track roads with passing places, walking on the right-hand side of the road to face oncoming traffic, not straddling the road in a group etc) and now the squirrels.

Come winter he will encounter the pothole slalom in rain and ice, though fortunately there will be fewer bicycles to avoid.

In spring there will be not only more cyclists but also pheasants whose road crossing indecision reaches dizzying heights that squirrels can only dream of.

He will reach home very much in need of his large/small malt (unlikely to be the small one).

I suggest that he takes out shares in his favourite whisky company to mitigate the pain. — Yours faithfully,

Beatrix Stewart

Benson

Was I in a war zone?

Sir, — I awoke during Saturday night believing I had somehow been transferred from Checkendon to war-time Vietnam.

Apparently, there’s a local sport round these parts known as hare-coursing. We didn’t have this in Kensington.

I only know this as I was rudely awoken by a police helicopter shining its bright lights through my bedroom window.

The familiar whirr of the engines took me right back to the late night war film I’d just watched.

Allegedly, a local chap driving an old battered Volvo was swiftly removed from the area.

Apparently he was guilty of no more than looking dodgy and being in possession of said Volvo.

I’m now thinking that I should change my car (a Volvo) or I too will be surrounded by cops and helicopters should I venture out looking badly dressed past 10pm. — Yours faithfully,

Victor Wilson

Checkendon

Eyot sure is in Henley

Sir, — I refer to your report on the meeting of Henley Town Council when it was agreed residents of Rod Eyot would not have to pay a fee when coming ashore to carry out normal everyday errands and business (Standard, October 15).

Your report said the island residents “wanted to be treated as Henley residents, even though the eyot is in Wokingham borough”.

I think this is most unlikely as Rod Eyot is not in Wokingham borough. It is in Henley and I imagine most island residents know that. Even some of us Henley residents who do not live on Rod Eyot know that.

The erroneous idea that Rod Eyot is in Berkshire seemed prevalent among councillors at the infamous fracas on August 31, even though many of those councillors have also sat on the planning committee which has considered planning applications from the island.

It is disappointing to see the Henley Standard maintaining this pernicious slander. — Yours faithfully,

Richard Guy

New Street, Henley

Thank you so much

I just want to thank those lovely people who gathered round with umbrellas and jackets and a cup of tea to help me when I fell at the bottom of Greys Road, Henley, on Monday. You know who you are.

When I saw your kind and smiling faces I thought I had died and gone to heaven.

This just brought it home to me how kind and helpful people really are. — Yours faithfully,

Name and address supplied