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The BNP question

2:21pm Friday 5th February 2010

MOST people in this county, perhaps a substantial majority, abhor everything the British National Party stands for. Despite the efforts it has made to appear a mainstream political movement, it remains on the fringe of democratic debate, peddling its bizarre mix of Toytown economic theory, Little Englander foreign policies and barely-disguised racial hatred.

Have a heart

2:11pm Friday 29th January 2010

IT IS the end of January and no doubt one or two of those new year resolutions may be at risk of being broken. It is a tough time in many respects, but we ask readers to make one additional resolution and back our Heart of Durham Appeal in some way, however small.

Be sure to listen

2:13pm Friday 22nd January 2010

IGNORING the views of 6,000 petitioners, and another 4,000 who expressed a view online, takes some doing in a city the size of Durham, but that is what the Government has done in its decision over the Market Place statues.

Battling on

1:45pm Friday 15th January 2010

THE problems faced by gritting lorries this week brought home the hazardous nature of the tasks faced by many public servants during the bad weather. Luckily, nobody was hurt when four gritters slid off the black ice-covered highways on Wednesday morning. But it was an indication of the difficulties faced, even as the weather improved, by those charged with keeping roads open, hospitals running and patients collected, meals delivered and providing all the services we take for granted at other times of the year.

Not an easy task

1:35pm Friday 8th January 2010

LOCAL authorities have come in for criticism this week. As the snow has fallen and the ice has formed, thousands of miles of roads and paths have become a lottery, especially so for the elderly and infirm.

A challenge ahead

12:47pm Wednesday 30th December 2009

AS 2010 looms, are there grounds for optimism in the new year? Uncertainty is still the greatest threat to those who look to the turn of the year for a change in economic fortunes. One certainty we have is that 2009 was a terrible year and there is no consensus about how 2010 will turn out.

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The human view

11:01am Wednesday 23rd December 2009

AT CHRISTMAS, a time of giving, we can focus on doing good. What we do with our lives, the only ones we know we have, is vital. We must do all that we can to create meaning and purpose, to achieve self-fulfilment and, more importantly, to help others do the same. We must strive for justice, liberty, tolerance and freedom from oppression throughout the world.

Taking care

1:08pm Friday 18th December 2009

THERE are few more emotive issues than closing old people’s homes, so the furore surrounding consideration of a plan to close seven homes in County Durham is predictable, if heartfelt.

Fingers crossed

1:50pm Friday 11th December 2009

IT’S difficult to see what more could have been done to push Durham’s bid to be the first UK City of Culture.

Independent view

11:29am Friday 4th December 2009

REGIONAL development agencies are set to become one of the battlegrounds in next year’s general election, with Labour and the Conservatives adopting very different positions on these bodies charged with spending so much of our money.

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