SIR – I thought your headline Rat Caught Under Bucket in Subway was very unfair and the reaction of some customers, frankly hysterical. The headline, and its positioning as your front page story, gave the impression that there was something very wrong with the hygiene at Subway. 
Some who saw only the headline (say in a newsagent’s) will have been given a very false impression. Subway cannot help it if it a rat enters their shop. The staff dealt with it sensibly and there was no reason whatsoever to close the shop when the rat had clearly had no contact with the food on sale. I, for one, will be making a special visit to Subway to buy a sandwich and show my support for this locally owned small business and urge others to do the same.
I would also question the news judgement of the Worcester News to splash this story on the front page. Is this storm in a bucket really more important than the news that after years of effort by Worcester politicians of all parties, Worcester schools are finally to get fair funding? This will be a major benefit to every child in Worcestershire for years to come, but warrants only a couple of columns on Page 5 and so is apparently thought to be much less important than one brief and uneventful visit by a rat to a sandwich shop. 
The Worcester News should be presenting and analysing the news that matters to the people of Worcester. If you continue to pump up hysterical trivia more suited to Facebook and Twitter then you will not survive and will not deserve to.
KELVIN HARD
Worcester

Labour wants an EU socialist Utopia
SIR – I was brought up in a working class family, but fail to see any connection between the Labour Party then and now. For years I have been baffled as to why the Labour Party has allowed millions of low-skilled Europeans to take working class jobs? Why have they not made the economic connection between an endless supply of cheap labour and the near zero growth of the working class wages? You don’t need to work alongside a Polish person to have your wages affected by supply side economics.
Well, I’ve finally worked it out. It’s Labour’s dream of a socialist utopia. The two faces of Labour. In Britain we see a centre-left party of capitalism and the establishment. But turn Labour around and you see an EU, back door socialist party, a left wing party, which is prepared to sacrifice the British working class on the altar of European socialism.
British socialists have always held a distaste for this country. George Orwell wrote in 1941 that pro-Russian Leftists and anti-British pacifists were chipping away at English morale. Leftists will always try to wear down our belief in our country, and our confidence in its ability to shape a future outside the European Union.
The EU propagates a socialist philosophy, jobs for all, welfare for all.
That’s fine, but what are the consequences of mass economic migration? Who pays the most? We do. The reality is that the real working people of Britain have never been part of the EU dream. Some 215 Labour MPs who want to stay in the EU don’t except that fact. I thought MPs were meant to represent their constituents? Not band together to support Eastern European socialist. Bring on Independence Day, June 24, when we can gain control of our borders, protect our National Health Service, protect future pensions, and rebuild the living wage.
LAWSON CARTWRIGHT
Leader Working Families Party


Bring our football team home
SIR – Worcester City Council should hang its head in shame. They are a disgrace. It is obvious that it wants Worcester City Football Club to go to the wall, it is so plain to see. It has done nothing to bring the team back home to Worcester. All it does is keep stalling which means that the ‘city’ will soon fold and leave us with no team at all.
What an absolute scandal. The whole thing stinks. Perdiswell is without doubt the perfect ground where they should be playing. It’s ideal, but the council does nothing to bring them home. The few killjoys and the odd councillor (who I might add has no interest in football and wasn’t even born and bred in the city) do their best to try and make feeble excuses why they don’t want football played at Perdiswell.
If the council is really serious about football returning to the city, bring them home now.
ANDREW STEVENS
Worcester

Letters page should be open to all readers
SIR – In answer to Maurice Francis, who wrote complaining “about letters from people outside the Worcestershire area being published in the Worcester News”.
Why the need to repeat yourself? And even more pertinent, why does the Worcester News feel obliged to do the same, by printing it again? In case the two have forgotten, I will repeat my answer in December 2014. Perhaps letter writing is not only for the good people of Worcester, but also for anyone from anywhere who reads the Worcester News.
JEAN HARRIS
Worcester

Surgeon and hospital staff saved my life
SIR – Re deaths after surgery at Birmingham QE Hospital. I had two serious cancer ops in 2008. I am still alive eight years later thanks to the expert surgeon, the doctors, nurses, porters and cleaners. They all kept me smiling during chemotherapy.
GEORGE COWLEY
Worcester