Padley Gorge

Don’t worry about the robberies, stabbings, drug dealing and murders sweeping through our local counties, allegedly through lack of police numbers and resources, a sunny afternoon jaunt in Derbyshire is the ideal tonic for them.

R Gissing snr

Jaunty Road, Sheffield, S12

My thanks to Matt

May I through your paper thank the very kind gentleman who said his name was Matt, who stopped his car on Carterknowle Road, Thursday, May 31, when I had tripped over the kerb and sat there dazed with a bleeding knee.

He took me to the nearest doctors, who could not help because I was not one of their patients.

He then drove me to my doctors, who had me cleaned up and put a pad on my knee in no time.

And then he drove me home, which was very kind of him.

Also the two other drivers who also stopped to help, I don’t think I could have managed by my self.

Thank you so much all of you.

Anne Diver

Greystones, Sheffield

Teaching toilet lessons

Teachers are very busy trying to teach the kids, a job I wouldn’t want, thank you very much.

But over a million hours are lost a year as teachers spend that precious time teaching the younger ones how to use the loo.

There are kids that can’t go on their own so will need help, but what are parents doing sending them to school at four and they are not potty trained?

That’s right, some parents don’t care and will always pass the buck, let someone else clean up the mess.

Jayne Grayson

Sheffield, S35

Left in the dark?

When all electric vehicles arrive en mass, one hopes there will be enough electricity left to power the necessities of daily life ie ,lighting, computers, washing machines, radios, televisions, and any other electrically-driven product.

Candles at the ready, we don’t want to be left in the dark.

EB Warris

Sheffield, S14

To read or not to read?

I agree with Brenda Wilkinson that people should be free to write about what they choose, (within the confines of what the law allows), but I do have a question about her advice to people not to read letters they do not like.

Could you please advise how one is to become aware of a letter’s contents without reading the letter?

Stephen Crowther

Greystones

Racist ramblings

I was disturbed and sickened by some of the racist ramblings of certain correspondents about Cllr Magid Magid.

If a Muslim refugee has reached the dizzy heights of being Lord Mayor its testament to the kind of city he lives in.

It’s a compliment to the people of the city and should be worn as a badge of honour by all persons in Sheffield and indeed, across the county.

If people are so insecure and unhappy about their city to feel that the new Lord Mayor is a threat then maybe their lives are so narrow that any sort of change is met with the type of hysteria we have seen to denounce Coun Magid.

I urge people to get behind the new Lord Mayor and help him push Sheffield to a better place.

Rubbishing him, the richness of Sheffield or the city as a whole isn’t acceptable.

Paddy J Cawkwell

West Street, Conisbrough, Doncaster

Freedom of opinion

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948 in the wake of the Holocaust expressed a commitment by the world to promote and observe a full suite of fundamental human rights. Article 19 of the UDHR protected freedom of opinion and expression in the following terms.

“Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”

In 2018 by virtue of the overwhelming rate of treaty ratification and its inclusion in the UDHR, freedom of speech is now considered to be a norm of customary international law.

I respectfully bring this information to your readers’ attention following the adverse comments made by a minority of them against the Star and its editor Nancy Fielder for publishing a readers’ opinion that “Sheffield should only have a white person of English descent for Lord Mayor and certainly not a black Moslem (sic) immigrant.”

I fully agree with Councillor Jack Scott’s view that it was right for the Star to publish both sides of the reaction, and that it would be misleading to hide readers’ comments and pretend the disagreeable views don’t exist.

The newspaper and editor should not be castigated for printing the personal view of a correspondent who was not inviting the public to share his own opinion.

While the vast majority, myself included, will disagree with his views, he should be allowed to express them in the local press and for them to be published at the discretion of the editor – who has quite rightly done so in this case.

While being fully supportive of national legislation put in place to protect the rights and stature of black and ethnic minority citizens, I feel that the pendulum has swung too far in this matter, to the extent that the vast majority of white citizens in the UK are now afraid to speak about their fellows because they will be called racist and are fearful of being hauled before the courts for speaking their mind, which is NOT the same as inciting racism.

Cyril Olsen

Busk Meadow, Sheffield, S5