Three decades of failure

August 17, 2005

Dear Sir,

I have to voice my concern for the feelings of the insufficiently educated young people whom Jonathan Dyer called ?Blockheads? in his letter published on August 16. This community has been failing its young people for at least three decades. There has always been an alarmingly high percentage of birth to single mothers in Bermuda, as long as I can remember (40 years or so). But 40 years ago, those babies were often raised by grandmothers, so they had a fairly stable infancy and possibly where encouraged to learn in school. In more recent years, teenagers having babies have mothers who are also single or who find it necessary to work full time anyway, so these babies of teenage mothers have been increasingly put out to day care from a few weeks of age and passed from babysitter to babysitter on weekends and evenings.

Without a structures family environment, without parents who dedicate themselves to encouraging and rewarding good behaviour, good study habits and careful choices of companions, the cycle of un-motivated, disappointed or neglected children making no effort to learn, dropping out of school and getting into drugs and sexual promiscuity just continues to spin out of control. It is my opinion that we have lost a large percentage of at least two generations of our young Bermudians. Our children are the future of the Island, without guidance, encouragement and steady support, how can we produce a generation which is capable of managing to get itself out of a brown paper bag, let along run and Independent nation?

Building new school building is not the answer to our problem, we have to stop permitting children to breed, keep them in school and reward them for responsible behaviour and good grades, further make it impossible to leave school until they have achieved an acceptable level of competency in the use of the English language and at least basic math skills combined with general knowledge to graduate through an internationally recognised standard of school leaving certificate. There are very few dumb kids, but I fear there are far too many disinterested, uninvolved parents and far too many either inexperienced, discouraged or intimidated teacher. We need to recruit teacher with real proven teaching skills with sufficient years of experience to cope with the problems we have. Hiring teachers right out of college, just because they are Bermudian or the right shade of tan is not helpful to our public education system. A good teacher can be any shade of the rainbow, but he has to have been taught how to teach and keep the kids attention riveted on the subject.

Enough of this nonsense, the graduation rates here are a total disgrace an it has nothing at all to do with the school buildings. If the private schools can do it properly, so can the ?public system?. Spend the money on good teachers and good teaching materials and keep the kids in school until they qualify to graduate, then they will not need to sit on the wall selling drugs to survive or make babies to fill the emotional void in their lives.

Beyond mere stupidity

August 17, 2005

Dear Sir,

In the plethora of misinformation we the general public are subjected to by the media on the Palestine/Israel conflict, one that really stood out recently was in your world?s opinion column of August 16, 2004 by Corriere Della Sera, Italy on Ariel Sharon. The newspaper falls over itself admiring Sharon for magnanimous gesture in the settler pullout of the occupied territory of Gaza and returning the area to its actual owners who were driven out in 1967. I have covered in some detail in many previous letters the origin of the state of Israel so do not intend to repeat that.

It would or should be abundantly clear to anyone with any basic intelligence and a little knowledge of the area, that 8,000 settlers living in land that belonged to the surrounding 1.5 million neighbours was unsustainable economically. It required approximately 30,000 IDF soldiers to guard from attacks from angry Palestinians. To view Sharon as anything other than what he is ? a committed Zionist whose agenda is and always been crystal clear ? is beyond mere stupidity in my opinion. Sharon is being given approximately $2.2 billion dollars by the US to relocate the settlers. Do the arithmetic. There are 8,000 setters. Compound that with the fact that the homes and some infrastructure is being destroyed by the Israelis and the Palestinians will most assuredly not get $2.2. billion to help them relocate.

What you will see is the consolidation of Sharon?s setters in the occupied West Bank and by his own admission settlements he has not giving up. What we have is Sharon giving up a hill to get a mountain. In my opinion not only that but once Gaza is clear, he can launch a savage attack without endangering Israelis. He already controls the airports, the seaports and will cripple the area economically. The resultant chaos with different Palestinian factions and the police destroyed by the Israeli?s is predictable. Far from advancing the Road Map to peace, it may have the opposite effect. It would be rewarding to get a factual report on the situation. But in spite of its being being in the forefront of the news, that ?s not happening. And don?t hold your breath waiting for that to change anytime soon.

Two burning issues

August 19, 2005

Dear Sir,

I feel compelled to write about two subjects which continue to be topics of discussion. The first is the issue of horses working in the heat of Bermuda?s summers. I totally agree with Annie Sousa?s letter in its entirety so there is not need to repeat what she has already mentioned but I will repeat that the Corporation of St. George?s should be absolutely ashamed for not providing adequate shelter for these poor horses. It is bad enough they are forced to trudge about t Bermuda in the heat of the summer pulling heavy carriages but the fact that you people cannot show some human compassion and provide these horses with a very basic need of shelter from the heat of the day is disgraceful! It is amazing if you can sleep at night! I would encourage all animal lovers to write letters and lobby your politicians so something is done for these horses. I personally would like to see the ban of these horses having to pull carriages period!

The second subject is the Government?s consideration of banning single people and expatriates from owning cars. Firstly, I see that the real traffic problem is in the early morning between 7.30 a.m. and 9.30 a.m. depending on which parish one lives and then again between 5 p.m. and 6.30 p.m. There is no real traffic problem at night nor during weekends. to ban one or two groups of people from owning cars is exceptionally inequitable whether they be single or expatriate. I am a single female who needs my car. I have two dogs and need my car to drive them to the vet. I cannot take my dogs on the bus and there are very few, if any, taxi drivers who will transport me with my two dogs to the vet. What happens when single people who own dogs or animals genuinely have a medical emergency at 2 a.m.?

This has happened to me at least three time is in the past and I have had to rush one of my dogs to the vet for emergency treatment. If I could find a taxi at that hour, it is unlikely the driver would agree to take my dog and me to the vet especially if your dog is sick. Also as a single female, if I choose to go out at night, I would like the safety of my car to drive home again, one cannot always rely on finding a taxi. I suggest the Government focus on controlling the traffic problem between Monday and Friday each week during the peak/busiest hours in the daytime only, excluding public holidays, instead of banning certain groups of people from totally owning a Car.

A lesson for all?

August 22, 2005

Dear Sir,

I noted the following quote from an interview with a local restaurateur, ?If you see a guy and he?s being productive, you should use him as a role model, not as someone to get rid of, regardless of where he comes from.? Maybe Ewan Ratteray should have invoked this Christian thought before firing Alan Tilson for no apparent good reason. Yours faithfully

St. George?s

Change the traffic laws

August 18, 2005

Dear Sir,

I am angry. What is it going to take to stop this speeding and reckless behaviour on our roads? I try to drive my bike within the speed limit, and every day some idiot passes me on their bike, in many cases within 18 inches, at speeds which I estimate to be between 50 to 65 kph. Not only do they drive recklessly, but there seems to be an increase in sailing through STOP signs as well as completely ignoring traffic lights (particularly within the city). I have witnessed individuals of all ages running red lights without any sense of responsibility toward other road users. And they are getting away with it?

The recent case reported in your paper of Wednesday, August 17th under the heading ?Warwick man admits speeding at 105 mph? causes me to to wonder why this person was not given a prison sentence. Instead the Magistrate merely imposes fines and a disqualification (which he, in all likelihood will ignore). I ask the question ?is human life worthless??. Supposing he had caused the death of one or more persons through such reckless behaviour ? and this is daily happening (recklessness) on our roads, although thankfully not at this speed).

I don?t know where the radar was located when he was clocked but I do recall many, many years ago of one of the first traffic deaths along the stretch of Middle Road in Southampton, near to the Esso Service Station, where a family out for Sunday walk was struck by one of two cars which were racing each other. The father was instantly killed. The driver received a prison sentence of several years. Back then there were very, very few cars in Bermuda. All the more reason in this case for a goal term to have been imposed (and don?t tell me that today, with our widened roads, it is not as dangerous to speed!). The traffic laws need to be seriously revised and the penalties for breaking them made much harsher if we are to survive as a ?civilised? community

Paget