SIR – I would like to draw readers’ attention to last week’s article about the celebrations held at Croome by Morris Dancers celebrating sunrise on the arrival of spring.

However, according to Pagan tradition, the first day of spring occurs on February 1, a sabbat known as Imbolc which celebrates the first stirrings of life and regrowth in the new year with the arrival of snowdrops and early shoots, not according to your article on 1st May.

May 1 (May day) in the Pagan tradition celebrates the first day of summer (not spring) and is known as the sabbat of Beltane. This is a fire fertility festival held to encourage plentiful growth for crops in the coming months and a celebration to the return of the sun’s power to the earth. Beltane falls between the Spring Equinox (March 21) and the Summer Solstice (June 21).

Jane Williams

Pershore

Who pays for refugees?

SIR – Re: Make Syrians Welcome.

I truly do feel sorry for these refugees, but we can’t keep picking up the tab to house and feed them. Australia and America don’t do it, it is the tax payer again having to pay. Who is housing and feeding the homeless in Worcester? Look to our own poor and homeless first.

Fifty Syrian refugees – will ISIS be with them? Odds on they will be. How many have got here in the last year with the influx over the borders, jumping on lorries, getting out here, only the other week there were a number caught in Evesham.

REGINALD DANIELS

Kidderminster

Hysteria of ‘Remnants’

SIR – I am endlessly fascinated by the political “geeks” among us who can spout endlessly on the minutia of politics, especially when putting the boot into those who want flee Europe’s cesspit.

I quickly had my fill of the toxic malarkey being blabbered by the “Remnants,” including “Call Me Dave,” who has now attempted to lash those who wish to leave with the prospect that such a vote might usher in genocide and the last World War. Such hysteria marks the desperation of the “New Europeans.” If it takes such a diabolical threat to bring those not seduced by the EU propaganda machinery into line, where will Cameron go, when the “Brexits” ignore his now clearly psychotic exhortations?

Everything I’ve read and heard on the Euro-debate is patronisingly irrelevant. There is only one issue before us. It is: “Do we want to live in a Sovereign nation in which those we elect run our country? Or do we want to our nation managed by Europe’s unaccountable bureaucracy, whose strings are pulled by “Frau Mertle,” which will continue to pour more millions into our nation, despite the fact that housing is rocketing beyond reach, while our schools and hospitals are buckling under the strain of ever more people? Let us tell Europe to go to hell. Let us find the courage to stand alone, while Europe is again consumed by its own stupidity!

N TAYLOR

Worcester

Thank EU for clean water

SIR – I would like to add just one more reason for us to vote to stay within the EU. The tragic death of six-year-old Caroline Wakefield from polio, contracted after swimming in sewage-contaminated sea off Gosport in 1957, raised the profile of bathing water pollution. This led to the European Bathing Water Directive which was introduced in 1976.

When the Directive first came out, the UK only had 27 safe bathing beaches – fewer than land-locked Luxembourg! This year, forty years down the line, the UK has more than 600 designated bathing beaches, many of them boasting better water quality than they did in the 1980s.

A recently-revised version of the Directive will ensure that information about water quality and pollution events is obvious to beach goers. At beaches with consistently poor water quality, warnings will be posted advising against swimming.

European Directives for bathing waters and sewage treatment have been instrumental in cleaning up water quality at UK beaches, Before the European Bathing Water Directive was introduced, many UK beaches were impacted by continuous untreated sewage discharges – we were literally swimming in poo.

In 1988 just over a third of those beaches monitored failed to meet even the minimum standard considered fit for bathing – often unbeknown to beach visitors. Now when we go on holiday to British seaside resorts, we can be assured that the water is clean and safe, thanks to the European Union.

Richard Udall

County Councillor for St John’s

Thanks for all the help

SIR – We would like to thank everyone who supported our coffee and cake morning on the Queen’s birthday, April 21. All money raised, £110, has gone towards a summertime band in the Lido Park. A special thanks to Morrisons for their contribution of lovely cakes.

SHEILA NEARY

Social Secretary Droitwich Forum for Older People