A421 should become a 50mph road

October 12 2008

Sir - I travel everyday from Bedford to Milton Keynes for work.

I know how bad the traffic is on A421 and how carelessly the drivers drive especially during night time.

Though the signs 'High Casualty Route' and 'Unmarked Police Patrol' are put up to warn drivers they don't act as deterrent to stop them to drive on with high speed.

If the 50 mile speed limit is imposed on A421 right from ASDA roundabout to Junction 13 of the M1, the problem of road accidents could be much reduced.

Arun Kumar

Hartwell Drive, Kempston

Cranfield is crammed Sir - Following on from Cllr Tim Hill's letter regarding the impending building of the Eco-town in the Marston/Brogborough area and the effect of traffic flow on the A421, you should also be adding the additional traffic that the building of the additional 700+ homes on Home Farm in Cranfield will cause.

As a Cranfield resident, we have seen an increased flow of traffic through our village in recent times by motorists taking a 'short-cut' to MK and when, like last week, the A421 was closed on two separate days, the increased volume of traffic (including 40-tonne capacity articulated trucks passing through the village) it became unbearable not to mention dangerous.

Top this situation up with the regular accident (as last Thursday) at the top of the 'death-trap' Milbrook/A507 turn, and gridlock prevails.

If either of the two proposed developments go ahead, it will need the A421 turning into a motorway, not just a dual carriageway.

G Powell

Lincroft, Cranfield

Whose idea, Patrick? Sir - Election fever seems to be boiling in Bedford; not the best time for rational discussion.

Acolytes of Patrick Hall, MP for Bedford and Kempston have been writing to the press and to me personally asking that I take on 'his' suggestion that I appoint a gypsy and travellers officer and learn from other authorities about how to move them on from illegal sites more quickly.

As most start by saying they were present at the public meeting on September 11, I find that surprising.

In my initial speech I announced exactly these measures. If anybody wants a copy of it, I'll be happy to make one available.

The one point on which Patrick Hall and I disagreed was over his instant adoption of the idea of emergency transit sites.

I explained that, while I was not opposed in principle, the idea had to be carefully thought through. They would need planning permission; would this cause the same difficulties as permanent transit sites? I suspect it would.

Travellers and gypsies are not necessarily a happy band of brothers; how would the sites be controlled?

And how to prevent them becoming no-go outlaw camps like we have seen in Bedfordshire in the past. How easy would it be to reclaim the site after the building of a permanent site if some travellers had been living there for several years? There is nothing as permanent as a temporary solution.

Without serious answers to these serious difficulties I have no intention of rushing into this solution.

Elsewhere in last week's Bedfordshire on Sunday we have Peter Hand posing as champion of Brickhill's wide open spaces.

The picture he draws is somewhat different to what happened when I met a deputation of Conservative councillors. Hand asked me for an assurance that any move to develop land in Brickhill would be dealt with politically and discussed in council which I gave him, hardly the tablethumping exercise he implies.

Once again it was claimed that the council had withdrawn the golf club as a possible development site. Once again I pointed out that this was because the council was already using it... as a golf club, and did not need to find a use for the land.

Only nine months of this before the new unitary council election in June 2009, and 18 months before the next general election. Oh, joy!

Frank Branston

Mayor of Bedford Borough Council

Taken for a ride Sir - I am always a little miffed when I hear people using Christianity in a non Christian debate.

The thoughts of Deirdre Dawson need to be in context.

She says she is on benefits and for whatever reason is her business. This country, quite rightly helps those when help is needed however, it does make all the taxpayers' blood boil to hear comments about the travellers.

I bet Ms Dawson does not drive a £30,000 Mitsubishi Shogun or Outlander, which pulls a very big caravan which needs a large cheque to purchase. If benefits are there to help travellers to fund their lifestyle where does the queue start to fill in the forms!

Furthermore we heard at the meeting that most of the travellers return to their houses in the winter, which makes a complete mockery of us all. The dirt, filth and destruction left behind every year on our lovely open spaces is a true testament of non-Christian approach that the travellers take and not the opinion of the society that we all conform to.

So Ms Dawson that's what I think!

Ray Hostler

King Edward Road, Bedford

Leave landlords to it Sir - I am writing regarding your article in BoS concerning The Royal Oak at Roxton.

I was landlord of the Oak for six years, in which time we set up the post office at the back of the pub when Mrs Marshall retired.

I must say that they were six very happy years, in which time I and my wife at the time made a lot of good friends and became part of the village.

This village needs a pub and post office, and if it was not for the greed of the brewery, who impose ridiculous rents on landlords and charge extortionate prices for a barrel of beer there would be more people willing to take on this and other public houses.

The licensing trade is the only trade that I know that if a landlord is making a success at his business the more the brewery wants in return, which is not only true with our local brewery but is typical all over the country. It's about time they, the brewery companies stopped milking successful landlords and left landlords alone to make decent livings.

I, among thousands of other people do not want to sit at home drinking cheap beer from a supermarket but want to go to a decent pub to meet people and enjoy a good pint of beer at a reasonable price.

Who knows if I was treated better by the local brewery I might still be landlord of the Royal Oak Roxton.

Ray Gaines

Former Royal Oak landlord

Efforts count for zero Sir - Having read Hannah Bordiss' article on 'Greener constructions' in your business section I think she or you would do a real service to us all if you could give us a simple definition of 'zero carbon' buildings.

Logically, I would have thought the carbon output (from heating, lighting, etc) would have to be cancelled out by carbon savings (from solar, wind, etc generation).

Possibly, the savings would also have to balance the carbon released in building the house.

If either of these definitions was right, I'd expect both national carbon savings and the extra costs to be higher than Ms Bordiss suggests, but I'm no expert.

I'd applaud better insulated homes (particularly if we have enough building inspectors to check that the insulation actually goes in) but if that's all a 'zero carbon house' is it would be a glib use of language.

Worse, we would be fooling ourselves that we were doing more than we really are to combat climate change.

Rob Wall

Conduit Rd, Bedford

It's a job to read it Sir - I would like to register my objections to an advert published in this week's BoS, jobs section.

Like many people I am looking for employment. On page 59 I came across an advert in a foreign language which I find a little confusing and disturbing purely on the grounds that I cannot understand it as it is not written in the language of this land.

As we are an English-speaking country and BoS is written for and by English-speaking people I feel this is discrimination, be it on a small scale, and is leaving me feeling excluded. I am not trying to be politically correct or wanting to go into print, just understand why the paper feels that this was acceptable.

Of course at this point I feel the need to have to add that I am neither racist nor against our foreign speaking citizens finding employment.

It's just that I would like to have an equal chance of understanding what is in my local paper and this advert does not allow this.

Christine Hancocks By email

■ Sir - While reading through the jobs section of your English newspaper I came across an advertisement in a foreign language.

Was this put in by mistake? Is this fair and just as I don't speak another language. I do feel discriminated against as this may well have been the perfect job for me but hey-ho we'll never know will we?

My daughter reminded me of the cleaner women who sued her employer for a vast some of money because she signed a contract she didn't understand.

At the time everyone thought how ridiculous, funny and stupid. Maybe you can let me know who's wrong and who's right.

Graham Bath

Flitwick

Editor's note:We are revising our procedures Kempston left to rot Sir - I write in response to the Mayor's recent cameo appearances in your newspaper on the business exodus in Bedford town centre.

However, appearing in a newspaper is one thing, reviving the fortunes of our local economy is quite another.

The Mayor is keen to blame supposedly greedy landlords for the decline and closures of many local businesses, but seems, deliberately or otherwise, to ignore the lack of substantial footfall in Bedford town centre as a key factor.

It concerns me more that his focus is so short-term and limited only to Bedford town centre.

I have heard nothing from the Mayor about how he plans to help struggling businesses in Kempston, where 20,000 residents shop and live.

Perhaps this should come as no surprise. Despite his election as Mayor six years ago, he has formed a Town Centre Working Group for Bedford but not for Kempston. He has lavished millions on the Howard Centre while the Saxon Centre has been left to rot.

The Mayor needs to get real here.

Rather than blaming landlords, he should hold his hands up and admit that he promised in 2002 that "my priority will be to revive the borough's faltering economy" and has failed.

That was a personal pledge and he must accept personal responsibility for that pledge, and admit that many businesses in Bedford, Kempston and across the borough are struggling primarily due to a lack of substantial footfall.

Many residents and businesses should be wondering whether the Mayor can offer the strategic leadership they need to "revive the borough's faltering economy".

Councillor Jas Parmar

Conservative Borough Councillor, Kempston South Ward

Weasel insurers Sir - The recent legal judgement that our police force will not have to fork out £42m to the insurers of Yarl's Wood following the fire on Valentine's Day 2002 will hopefully put an end to a long-running, unnecessary and grossly unfair court case.

Bedfordshire Police had their advice to the Government ignored in the Home Office's rush to build the asylum detention centre to deliver a fictitious target of returning asylum seekers.

They then turned up on the night of the inferno to do a very brave job at considerable risk, only for their trouble to find weasel insurers and underwriters suing them, making the most of the Government's failure to cover such an eventuality in their contract with Group 4.

Truly an unacceptable face of business allied to the incompetence of this Government, as well documented in the independent inquiry report of Stephen Shaw.

I have pressed the Government continually to ensure that not one penny is lost to our local police from this incident, for which local ratepayers have been threatened when Bedfordshire is fulfilling a national responsibility.

I will be insisting now that all legal costs are equally covered, while at the same time asking for the money currently being paid by our local PCT for health care at Yarl's Wood to be recoverable from the NHS.

I trust the insurers will have the grace not to appeal, but I am not holding my breath.

Alistair Burt MP