Letters: Neighbourhood policing must continue to be supported as the foundation of a proactive defence

Armed police outside White Hart Lane (PA)

The terrible events in Paris have brought an immediate response from government in committing additional funding for the SAS, armed police officers and intelligence services. The need for such resource to tackle an attack on the streets of Britain is obvious.

Clearly, preventing such attacks occurring in the first place is of paramount importance, and neighbourhood policing must continue to be supported as the foundation of a proactive defence.

Prior to the Paris attacks, and amid suggestions of 25 to 40 per cent cuts, the Government invited police and crime commissioners to submit their views on future funding for police forces. In my response I made clear to Home Secretary Theresa May, as did others, that following the severe budgetary cuts of the past five years there is no slack left. Further funding cuts will threaten the frontline and, in particular, neighbourhood policing.

I know from attending over 320 community meetings since being elected, how highly the public regard the work of community-based police officers, support officers and staff. One of the many benefits of this partnership approach is that vital intelligence comes to the ears of the police early and snippets of information can be pieced together centrally to give early warning of the most serious of crimes.

Since the events in Paris I have met and spoken specifically to some senior community leaders and our senior police officers. All are of the opinion that the strong community networks, formal and informal, and excellent partnership working we have in Cleveland, are an essential line of defence against such horrific attacks occurring here.

We must not weaken these links and networks and I will continue to urge the Home Secretary and Prime Minister to take on board the advice they are receiving nationally and locally to safeguard neighbourhood policing at all cost. Now is not the time to be cutting policing.

Barry Coppinger

Police and Crime Commissioner for Cleveland

Middlesbrough

Andrew Grice reports “Labour moderates” as saying that Jeremy Corbyn’s view that UK intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan has increased the threat of terrorism comes “close to making excuses for acts such as the Paris massacres” (“Foreign wars put Britain at greater risk of terrorism, says Labour leader”, 21 November).

This nasty non sequitur amounts to nothing more than a form of verbal bullying.

David Parker

Holmfirth, West Yorkshire

Wrong person in charge of the NHS

I find it difficult to believe that anyone could consider that junior doctors are not a vital part of the NHS (letter, 20 November). If we do not have junior doctors today then how can we have GPs and consultants tomorrow?

It takes 10 years at least to train as a GP and part of that training is valuable experience gained as a junior doctor. My daughter qualified as a GP only two weeks ago and I could not fail to be aware of the challenging journey she and her contemporaries faced throughout their training.

I am surprised about the specification for the position of Secretary of State for Health. Apparently it is acceptable to be health minister with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics, not medicine. No one should be in the position of managing the NHS, which employs more than 1.6 million people, putting it in the top five of the world’s workforces together with the US Department of Defence, McDonald’s, Walmart and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, without appropriate qualifications, which must surely include a medical degree.

A Secretary of State for Health who has engineered a situation whereby key personnel within our vital NHS are even contemplating strike action has got the whole issue badly wrong. He should have the grace to accept this and stand down. Perhaps his background is more suited to one of the other four largest employers listed above.

Sally Bundock

Eastcote, Middlesex

Surely these Tories cannot be so stupid? They were educated at Eton and Oxbridge.

No, it must be that they are deliberately destroying the NHS, by not training enough doctors and nurses, preventing foreign nurses coming to Britain, and so on; finally this contract and the appalling refusal to negotiate politely, causing the NHS to become such a shambles that there will be no choice but to bring in American profit-making health companies.

Henrietta Cubitt

Cambridge

Drawing frontiers in the Middle east

I take issue with many of the points Robert Fisk makes (20 November) about the Sykes-Picot treaty, which was, for Great Britain, executed by my grandfather and namesake, Sir Mark Sykes. At least under colonialism (then a system ruling much of the world) there was stability.

Two of my grandfather’s closest friends and advisers were the future monarch Ibn Saud, and the Emir Abdullah. He was also friendly with Chaim Weitzmann, and my grandfather and the Emir Abdullah were both involved in the drafting of the Balfour Declaration. Sir Mark was something of a romantic; he saw nothing contradictory in being both a knowledgeable Arabist and being attracted by the notion of Zion.

Of course, some frontiers are obsolete and have to change; frontiers are changing all the time, usually with no reference to the populations; but a world without borders? I think not. Europe was redefined with terrible consequences after the Second World War (anyone remember East Prussia?), and as for saying we live in a “borderless world”, have a look at Calais, Hungary, or indeed the Turkish-Syrian border. The Near and Middle East was in any case already divided by the artificial frontiers imposed by the Ottoman Empire.

Politicians have invariably, of recent years, failed to realise that a bad political solution may be the best one available. Saddam in Iraq, Gaddafi in Libya and Assad in Syria at least maintained order, and the only people they murdered were their own people and their rivals, a tradition in Islam since the days of the first caliphs.

They also maintained their borders and prevented precisely the transnationalism which is a current strength of Isis, as Mr Fisk rightly points out.

So, Mr Fisk, please give my grandad a break.

Mark Sykes

London W8

The Sykes-Picot agreement is widely condemned but perhaps the time has come for a more enlightened application of a similar idea.

Kurdistan, if formally recognised as a new nation with clearly identified borders, could be a valuable ally to those countries with an interest in peace in the region. It has a unifying ethnic character and is a, more or less, coherent country even now.

Turkey could choose to exchange territory for enduring peace, to her enormous benefit. Syria and Iraq would shrink and become less ethnically fraught.

Similarly, if those countries with an interest in solving the present migrant/refugee crisis were to employ their energies in identifying suitable territory and supporting the creation of a new sanctuary nation within easier range of those territories currently losing population, much could be gained.

That’s how America came into being – refugees (all comers) and a new nation. There is a precedent. Give desperate people an opportunity and remarkable things can happen.

Steve Ford

Haydon Bridge Northumberland

In his article of 20 November, Robert Fisk gives an explanation, but not an excuse, for the actions of Isis (Isil, Daesh) and similar groups.

In view of the seemingly endless mistakes made by France, Britain and, more recently, the US in their policy in the Middle East (in my view largely brought about by our insatiable demand for oil), if the world ever does get as far as a peace conference for the region, the question of the creation of a state called Arabia should not be off the agenda.

Peter Giles

Whitchurch, Shropshire

Court charge is wrong in principle

More than Keir Starmer, Anthony Young (letter, 21 November) has put his finger on what is wrong with court charges: that justice is a public good from which we all benefit; therefore it should be paid for, not by defendants, but by all of us through taxation.

Keir Starmer is wrong to say that the court charge has two defects, which, it is implied, could be rectified; it does not; it is thoroughly wrong in principle.

John Dakin

Toddington, Bedfordshire

Archbishop seems to put up with a lot

The Archbishop of Canterbury found himself “doubting God” in the wake of the Paris shootings. I find myself wondering why none of the other atrocities, for example the US drone strike that killed many Médecins Sans Frontières staff recently, or drowned refugee babies, has him doubting God.

Smita Tomalin

Totnes, Devon