Letters to the Editor - August 8th 2007

Aug 8 2007 Liverpool Daily Post

The chance of a lifetime

RE: THE Everton FC stadium proposal. I believe that the fact that the new ground will be in Kirkby is immaterial.

Until I came to Liverpool as a student in 1956, I had in my youth been a Grimsby Town supporter.

Grimsby were an old club with a fine tradition. The fact that their ground – Blundell Park – had always been in Cleethorpes did not concern any of the supporters.

As a qualified architect, I also believe the design of the new ground as presently illustrated is excellent. It is a good, straightforward, modern football stadium.

And as someone who, although recently retired, has run a business for several years, I think this opportunity for the club to gain so much for so little outlay is literally the chance of a lifetime. It is unlikely a similar opportunity will come again.

As an Everton supporter – now for over 50 years – I have a great love for Goodison Park and inevitably the move to Kirkby would take a while to get used to, but at the end of the day it is the club itself that is of paramount importance.

Players and managers come and go, kits change with increasing regularity, so surely Everton FC and its supporters can take a ground move in their stride.

David Patchill, Chester

Surrender of city

I WHOLEHEARTEDLY agree with S O’Flynn of Birkenhead (Daily Post Letters, July 30).

I have followed Everton home and away for 40 years and the people who are pushing this move are just not in touch with the feelings of Evertonian Scousers, who live in the city.

I speak for many of my fellow Blues who see a move to Kirkby as a complete surrender of our city to the Reds.

The spin doctors are in overdrive with predictions of relegation if Kirkby doesn’t get a yes vote. I feel we are being railroaded.

The strength of Everton FC comes from one thing only and that is its fan base who are proud to be the oldest club in the city, proud that they still follow a mediocre team through thick and thin in their thousands.

They are proud that, despite Liverpool’s success, we still get gates of nearly 40,000 for our home games and sell our away allocations weeks in advance.

The City Council bent over backwards for Liverpool FC to build in a Victorian park.

The council must remember it has a duty to its city-based Evertonians and offer Everton a similar package, a move to Kirkby would be the death knell of Everton Football Club and the culture that goes with it.

G Jones, L4

Think again

A WISE-CRACKING Liverpool manager once said there are two teams in Liverpool, Liverpool and Liverpool reserves.

How ironic then when Bill Kenwright, the Everton chairman, a man who professes to be the custodian of our great football club, is allowing these sentiments to become a reality.

I beg him to think again.

If we have to move from Goodison, then a site inside the Liverpool city boundaries is a must.

Being born and bred in Croxteth, the site that comes to mind is at Gillmoss. It is not so long ago that Tesco promised Liverpool city council and the people of Croxteth that it would build a Tesco Superstore at Gillmoss helping to spearhead the regeneration of the area.

About the same time Everton Football Club talked about Gillmoss as a possible site for a new stadium. This site had everything needed for a stadium and retail site.

Everton should also be looking to build a stadium on the line of the Kings Dock design. An arena that could be used seven days a week for concerts and other events.

I say to Bill Kenwright think again. He keeps telling Evertonians it is only four miles to Kirkby – well, it’s only two miles for the people of Kirkby to travel to Tesco at Gillmoss.

M Fitzsimmons, L12

Vote on the move

HAVING been an Everton fan for over 60 years and a season ticket holder for the past 20 years, I know hundreds of fans from round this area who walk to the match and have a few pints on the way home, who have said we will not renew our season tickets from next season if Everton get moved to Kirkby.

Why have a vote, the answer will be no by at least 100-1.

Neil Dodd, L7

Leave us alone

I FULLY support S Andrews in his letter of July 30 entitled “A special place”.

I know there are many people who are completely opposed to a 60-storey tower, even any high buildings.

Please, please, leave our city alone, developers.

I note that Everton football fans are to be given a say in their future buildings and rightly so.

So should the public be given an opportunity to express opinion on the waterfront.

Name and address supplied

Final death blow

LIVERPOOL’S reputation has been dealt its final death blow. The biggest event of our year cancelled in one of our most important years ever – our 800th birthday – due to health and safety reasons.

The City Council and the Culture Company obviously failed to make any alternative arrangements in the event of the original plans going awry.

How the rest of the world must be laughing at us. I have very few hopes for Capital of Culture year now – I am so ashamed.

I have been a Lib-Dem voter for many years, but no more. The Lib- Dems have failed to deliver for this city and now it is time for someone else to try.

KH Shepherd, BA, L18

Public inquiry

I HAVE lived in Liverpool, off and on, for 55 years and I have always been proud of my city and cultural roots.

I was educated at Liverpool University, were I obtained double first-class degrees and a PhD.

I feel that I have some cultural credibility to express my complete lack of confidence in Liverpool City Council and the Capital of Culture Company to manage the European Capital of Culture project.

Their failure to co-ordinate and deliver the Mathew Street Festival without disruption is cause for serious concern. Nothing less than an immediate independent public inquiry and financial embargo on their affairs is called for.

I remain proud of my city. However, I have totally lost faith in the European Capital of Culture project.

Dr Robert Macdonald, RIBA, FRSA, via email

Tiresome debate

I FIND the ongoing debate about the Mathew Street Festival rather tiresome. People are saying that its cancellation is an embarrassment, but surely our councillors arguing over what is essentially a booze-up is more cringeworthy. There are plenty of real issues facing people in this city, just take a look around. Perhaps they should be taking more notice of these.

Neil Wilson, Old Swan

Priced out

MANY decades ago, pioneering city leaders, whose calibre would put the current administration to shame, constructed some of the most innovative and varied social housing programmes ever seen.

Over the course of the inter-war decades and following World War Two, thousands of properties were constructed across the city to house Liverpool’s growing population.

Granted, some of the properties did not stand the test of time, but many such estates still stand proud, with plenty of life left in them, estates like those in my own ward, such as the vast Florence Melly estate, in Walton, for example.

The properties were varied and geared at offering choice. They were affordable, also. What a pity that the housing strategy of the current city council is so destructive and exclusive. Bulldoze affordable housing and construct expensive property to replace it, at a time when the dearth of social housing is reaching epidemic proportions.

The ultimate reflection of this council’s distorted housing values is that the only people who can today afford panoramic views of the region are the yuppies and ultra-rich who can splash out on city centre apartments. The ordinary person has been priced out of such views – a completely immoral development.

Cllr Ben Williams, Labour councillor for Clubmoor, Liverpool City Council

Great NHS care

WHAT a disgusting comment from GH Amrit, West Kirby: “NHS has found a whole new way of killing people” (Letters, July 27).

Having spent three days in intensive care, my wife is in the high dependency unit at Arrowe Park Hospital.

I cannot imagine she could have better treatment anywhere. The nursing staff are wonderful, so professional and so caring, they are angels.

I can only assume GH Amrit has not spent time in hospital, otherwise he or she would not be so flippant with remarks about our NHS.

Ron Heslin, South Wirral

Help flood victims

HAVING read of the trials and tribulations of the flooded inhabitants of the UK, I have to ask where are those great humanitarians, Geldof, Bono and company?

They’re quick off the mark in fund-raising for other countries, so why haven’t they decided to contribute some of their millions, or arrange a fund-raiser for these unfortunates and, of course, don’t forget all the people whom we elected, who are content to sit on their backsides at Westminster, collecting fat salaries while pontificating that “something must be done”, and doing absolutely nothing !

Meanwhile, it seems only the Red Cross are doing something positive.

AJ Quinn, L11