Do not waste pounds 30 or your life ( switch it off.

After reading Mr Scargill's letter on the subject of hands free phoning while driving I was rather perplexed at his excuse for using a bluetooth wireless earpiece.

I bet it's safe to say that the vast majority, if not all, the phone calls made while one is driving have a content containing neither earth shattering nor life saving information. While the consequences of the call could put you, or worse, an innocent person in a life or death situation.

Like all motorists this letter is just an excuse for using a phone while driving, like the reason for speeding is that you have to spend too much time checking your Speedo rather than watch the road.

We are all good drivers or so we like to believe, the problem is it does not matter how good we think we drive it only takes one bad driver to bring us to our senses.

Do you really need to have your phone switched on while driving? Do you really need to make a call on a five-minute journey to the shops? At 70 mph, which appears to be the normal speed for driving these days. You are not out of contact for that long.

I for one do not know if my mobile phone supports a bluetooth wireless earpiece. What I do know is that it sends and receives and as such does not need to be updated and will never be just to look and feel cool with an overgrown hearing aid perched on my head.

To put it in perspective: if two vehicles are travelling towards each other at 70mph while your phone has rung three times you both have travelled half the length of the football pitch at St James's Park and you will not meet in centre circle to shake hands.

Do not waste pounds 30 or your life, just switch it off, at least that way you will be able switch it on again.

Mr D M Boon Newbiggin by the Sea

School well cared for and in good order

RE "School is safe, head assures parents", The Journal, September 21).

Cramlington's Brockwell Middle School appears well cared for and in good order and I can understand the headteacher's annoyance over recent allegations about its condition.

I was surprised to see Northumberland County Council becoming involved in the argument as they told councillors in April 2005 that pounds 5m would have to be spent on Brockwell for it to carry on as a middle school. They also said that it could be converted to a primary school for a similar number of pupils for only pounds 1m.

In the public consultation this year we were told that there was a budget of pounds 1,873,000 for converting Brockwell for use as a primary but Burnside are now claiming that even this is not enough.

If the pounds 5m is too high or, as now seems to be agreed, pounds 1m is too low, then the financial case shifts towards retaining the current system. Our councillors were strongly assured that the costs they were originally given were robust. They don't look very robust at the moment and our councillors should make sure they have proper information about such a potentially enormous investment programme.

Mike Brown, Ponteland

Muslim majority happy if this man quit UK

BOY did we get it wrong thinking the Russians were the enemy ( it appears the enemy is alive and well and all around us.

Those of you with longer memories may recall, long before Iraq hit the news, the Sunday papers were full of someone in Birmingham calling for an independent state of Islam ( because they didn't agree with our laws and didn't think they should have to abide by them. That was not an isolated incident and now we have Abu Izadeen and his pals insulting the Home Secretary, asking him how he dare to come to a Muslim area (this is in London incidentally). His colleague Anjem Choudary then apparently ranted on that Muslims do not need "British values" because their religion is superior!

As a non-religious person I find all religions to be much of a muchness. However, most of them manage not to let it get in the way of being British ( not, it seems, some of our male Muslim friends.

If Mr Choudary and his companions really hate "British values" that much ( there are a number of easy ways to leave the country.

I'm sure the silent majority of Muslims would welcome this just as much as the rest of us.

Peter Scargill Wark on Tyne 

Why Mr Shute was ahead of his time

FURTHER to the letter by Barbara Turnbull (The Journal, September 22) and the damage this New Labour Government has done not only to the monarchy but to the whole of Britain, I would say to your readers, read In The Wet by Neville Shute and this was written long before President Tony watched Jackie Milburn score all those goals.

Robin Thompson, Amble 

Conjuring up a world few would recognise

I AM writing to support the comments by John Hodge in respect of schools run by the Emmanuel Schools Foundation.

The particular Christian ethos of schools run by the ESF is a very narrow one.

The teaching on sexual matters as outlined in the prospectus for Emmanuel College, Gateshead, conjures up a world which few of us would recognise. Cash strapped local councils are attracted to academies because the sponsors pay part of the capital costs of the new school.

Yet the Government has decided that sponsors may no longer contribute to capital costs, but may donate this sum to a charitable foundation.

So ESF can run the school with largely sponsor-appointed governors, we pay for it in council and general taxes, the land (currently earmarked for housing) is given to the foundation, and the sponsor gets to donate his own money to his own charitable trust!

Chris Butterworth Rothbury

Appeal over colliery checks or tallies

I WONDER if you readers can help me with my hobby, which is collecting brass embossed colliery lamp checks or tokens and tallies as they are sometimes called.

These are brass discs with the name of the colliery on them as well as the miner's number. The miner would draw this check along with his lamp from the lamp room before going down the mine.

I am trying very hard to obtain some lamp checks from the collieries that once operated in the Durham Coalfield.

I have listed below the names of some of the col lieries I am trying to obtain a Lamp check from they are: Stanley Burn, Stargate, Emma, Clara Vale, Greenside, Phoenix Drift, Chopwell, Heworth, Ad dison, Wardley, Deaf Hill, Wheatley Hill, Shildon Drift, Trimdon Grange. I would also very much like to hear from anyone who once worked at and can remember these and other collieries working.

I can be contacted at 5 Cherry Grove, Norton Stourbridge, West Midlands, DY8 3YL.

PETER WALL West Midlands.