TODAY, Saturday, May 12, 2018, I used the 31X service to York from Helmsley.

I live in Kirkbymoorside, but found out that the service from Kirkbymoorside has been axed, so had to drive to Helmsley to catch the bus - so much for keeping cars off the road.

On checking the return timetables it would appear that bus companies do not consult with each other to provide a good service.

East Yorkshire Motors 128 service departs Helmsley at 1505, the new 31x service arrives at 1510, so anybody hoping to make a connection to Kirkbymoorside has to wait until 1625 for the next bus, a wait of 75 minutes, all because of a five minute time gap.

It seems incredible that in this case passengers needs are ignored.

Rural bus services are under threat, at least the few we have could be more passenger friendly.

A Carpenter, Kirkbymoorside

Fix dementia care

I WANT to encourage your readers to unite against dementia and take action to fix dementia care in North Yorkshire.

An Alzheimer’s Society investigation has discovered that 50,000 people with dementia were admitted to A&E across the country in the last year, because inadequate social care is leaving them unprotected from falls and infections.

This is a 70 per cent increase in the last five years, which tallies with cuts in social care funding.

Successive governments have shirked the issue of our threadbare social care system.

People with dementia are now forced to rely on services so starved of funding that they’re unable to protect them from harm and the doors of A&E, let alone provide specialist care and support.

There are almost 10,000 people living with dementia in North Yorkshire and this number is expected to rise.

The Government must work out how it will deliver high quality social care to everyone with dementia who needs it, and at a fair price.

Find out how you can take a small action to make a big difference and help fix dementia care at alzheimers.org.uk/daw

Linda Haggie, operations manager, North Yorkshire, Alzheimer’s Society

Consider this

RE: Traffic in Norton.

The gripes first: 1 There was a footbridge over the railway line; 2 There was two platforms at the railway station, which someone thought we didn’t need.

That was wrong, like the majority of things that the local planners do.

Council planning - they want the big money and the authority, but won’t make the decisions, which makes me think why employ such people who have no vision and usually don’t live in the town.

My answer to this traffic problem is look at the old plans.

I’m sure that it was mooted that a road should be put through Robsons, which is now Lidl, open up Park Road, build a bridge over the river and railway with a road onto the A64, and put a slip road from Broughton Road onto the A64.

Now I hear you all say what about Lidl? That’s easy, just build on the ATS site and surrounding areas, but do it sensibly, ie car park, then on stilts put a shopping mall with Lidl in it, then on top build some OAPs flats.

By doing this you will revitalise Commercial Street in Norton and alleviate a lot of the traffic problems.

I hope all the councillors read and consider this.

Richard Jones, Norton

Kick racism out

IT appears that the racism that runs through the Metropolitan Police has spread to North Yorkshire.

North Yorkshire Police have been found by an employment tribunal to have subjected an officer to ‘unconscious race discrimination’ as well as two instances of ‘direct discrimination’ due to his Pakistani ethnic origin (“Police officer wins race case”, Gazette & Herald, May 16).

I used to know quite a number of police officers in York and I never heard one of them come out with a racist comment. It must occur the higher up they go in their career - a career progression denied Zaheer Ahmed solely because of his ethnicity.

In the month and the 25th year after the callous murder of Stephen Lawrence we have our Prime Minister honouring him and his family by naming the day of his murder Stephen Lawrence Day.

In the same month, the Windrush scandal hit our media headlines.

Before our Prime Minister was handed the keys to Number 10 she spent about six years as Home Secretary during which she set in motion a large amount of legislation to create a “hostile environment” which made life difficult for genuine British citizens who just happened to be black, threatening them with deportation and refusing them the ability to work.

Let’s kick racism out of politics, the police, sport, life and society everywhere.

HF Perry, York