This is what you have been writing to us about this week.

To send your own letter, email bfpletters@london.newsquest.co.uk.

Please note, any letters sent to the Bucks Free Press office are only being picked up periodically as all staff are still working from home as per government advice.

Where is justice in measly sentence?

Unbelievable! That is what came to my mind when I read the BFP page 6 on Friday, October 30, regarding the case of a certain Mr James Lavine from Wooburn Green.

This driver killed a 13-year-old boy, Max Simmons, as he drove his car whilst over the drug-drive limit.

Sadly this wasn’t all that the article told us - it listed a catalogue of law-breaking incidents this maniac has committed which include drink-driving, driving while under the influence of drugs, speeding and dangerous driving!

You might just think that such an idiot driver would feel the full force of the law bear down upon him for committing such atrocities.

Well I’m sorry to say you would be wrong - for taking the life of a young man, Lavine was only sentenced to six years and nine months in prison.

What? Where is the justice in this measly sentence?

He won’t even serve that long anyway. Why wasn’t he given the maximum term - did the Judge not think he deserved it?

I have written to the BFP more than a few times about the injustices of our judicial system and this case proves something needs addressing badly! He killed a boy. Took someone’s young son away from them. So sad, this idiot should have got life.

When is the law going to be on the side of victims and not the criminals?

Roy Craig, Hazlemere

Spare a thought for the less fortunate

Should the right of way for the disabled be restricted so others may enjoy themselves?

No, electric buggy users, wheelchair users, walking with the aid of crutches, impaired vision and the blind - no way should their “right of way” be restricted.

What do these people (through the social media) who advocate the freedom of dining on the pavement ‘think’ or have any thought of ‘others’?

Personally I have never seen such an arrangement of outside dining tables, normally the main walkway is free with tables situated on either side.

I emailed Licensing.av@buckinghamshire on the 24th of August outlining my concerns as I’m registered with RNIB Bucks being sight impaired and conscious of those who are severely sight impaired (blind).

I did receive a reply four days later from a Brian Whittall staying he would check if The Chequers were not using parts of the pavement outside their authorisation area. No further communication since.

Bernard D Burger, Marlow

Just another charged car park

I assume all current users of the Park & Ride Car Park at Handy Cross will have noted that from 16 November that it will no longer be P&R but just another charged parking place.

Minimum charge £1.20 for four hours unless you can think of somewhere to go for under 30 minutes in which case it is free. “Charges apply at all times”.

So you might as well not bother to go by bus to High Wycombe and shop at a nearby store which provides free parking.

As no exceptions are mentioned in the order it means that a brief hospital visit or a quick visit to the railway station can only be done by using space in their respective car parks rather than Handy Cross.

Perhaps Waitrose will benefit but do not count on parking there within their time limits as it could get quite busy.

Park and Ride was a brave concept by the former Wycombe District Council but now we are under new management from Aylesbury such ideas may quickly disappear.

Michael Hyde, former user, via email

A plea from the High Wycombe Rotary

Our townspeople are enduring Covid-19 and troubled times but Wycombe has been there before.

The plague arrived in Wycombe in the summer of 1665, spreading out from London on the trade and communication routes. Henry Elliot was Mayor when the plague struck.

The register of burials gives just a glimpse of the horror. In July 1665, Richard Saunders was buried with Robert his son on the 25th day of the pestilence.

A week later, his three remaining children died on the 6th August followed by Mary his wife. Thomas Barton followed by his family and on and on...

In all 218 people died of the plague. While at this time Wycombe’s population was so much smaller than today’s population, the loss must have been horrendous.

Throughout the 1880s Typhoid claimed victims in the town to be followed in 1918 by Spanish Flu, which saw one of our local school buildings being requisitioned and used as a temporary hospital.

On to our present day plague, Covid-19, in which not only have many lives have been tragically lost, but there is rising employment as business shut, followed on by loss of income, and then accommodation as rents and mortgages can’t be paid.

Can I emphasise how much stress and loss of dignity this brings as family budgets tighten or disappear altogether?

The desperation generated, sadly, sometimes descends into domestic violence, separation and as always it is the children who suffer.

Then there is also the problem of the loneliness and isolation endured by so many in our community.

While we at the Rotary Club of High Wycombe can’t hold meetings, we are still busy working with and collecting for the town’s charities.

We have supported a number of local charities over the summer lockdown period.

Now Christmas, the season that is supposed to celebrate the year end, its achievements and progress is looming.

But this year collecting donations from the public will be challenging under Covid guidelines. We will be unable to raise money from helping out with the usual fireworks night events or organising our Santa Sleigh collections. What we would like to start your readers thinking about is that donations however small do help enormously.

Soon our Rotary will be organising various drives to raise money for local children’s and other town charities, to fund among other things Xmas food parcels which is done in conjunction with the police.

Some of these will go to the town’s disadvantaged young people and those who will be alone at the YMCA over Christmas with no festive fridge, family or entertainment to enjoy.

We can all help local charities by giving whatever we can even if it is only the loose change in our pocket.

If you would like to donate to help townspeople in need, then visit our Facebook page or our website - www.rotaryclubofhighwycombe.uk.

Anthony Mealing, President of the Wycombe Rotary

Please think of terrified pets

With fireworks season upon us, Blue Cross is urging people to consider the devastating effect they can have on pets and people and to be considerate of their neighbours around Bonfire Night.

Some 25 per cent of UK households are planning to have fireworks at home this year due to the cancellation of organised events.

We know only too well the fear and distress fireworks cause to pets, with 70 per cent of owners reporting their pets being affected - trembling, being physically sick and being too frightened to leave the house for days after.

We would urge people to let their know neighbours know if they’re planning to have fireworks and also to use low-noise fireworks and sparklers this year where possible for the sake of pets and people who may struggle with them across the country.

Claire Stallard, Blue Cross

‘Must be unavowed political motive’

Dear Mark Skoyles, thank you for trying to respond to my letter of 16 October about HS2.

When first questioned by me you refused to justify your approval for HS2, because you were ‘not in a position to indulge’ me. You then tried to justify it anyway by quoting a vote in the Commons by ‘unbiased’ MPs.

I pointed out what an unreliable proof this was and you have now replied that it was the preceding seven years of ‘consultation and debate’ before the Commons vote that proved it.

I was replying to your proof - the supposedly ‘unbiased’ vote in the Commons – why did you name this as your authority and why didn’t you quote some findings from the preceding seven years?

The seven years of ‘consultation and debate’ were the period during which I came to the conclusion that there was some unavowed political motive for favouring HS2.

In your last letter you say I quoted the chairwoman of STOPHS2 ‘repeatedly’ when I quoted her once only – very aptly I think.

You call what she had to say: ‘a ridiculous and bias (sic) argument for the chairwoman to make’ – what she said is not an argument – it is a statement of the obviously true - the report stage and the third reading of the bill were rushed through together and: “…just 37 minutes given to debate a £56bn project… works out at over £1.5bn per minute”.

You seem eager to question the sense or good faith of people who disagree with you and to suggest they are agitators – there are ‘a few retired rail engineers in the pay of #STOPHS2’, ‘a hardcore who seem to want us all to live in Bronze Age ‘communes’’, Penny Gaines’ opinions are ‘ridiculous and bias’, and of course there is me – ‘Mr Linehan… has made it clear that he hasn’t or won’t hear “the case for HS2”’.

Has it occurred to you that what is clear to you may not be so clear to everyone else, that you need to justify your clarity, and that your opponents are rational and intelligent people talking in good faith?

Has it occurred to you that your opponents may actually see things more clearly than you, and that some of the ‘unbiased’ people you are supporting might be acting in accordance with their private or commercial interests?

I must apologise if I gave the impression you were campaigning for HS2 here on the letters page, when you were merely offering an opinion that the BFP expressed succinctly for you - that the council should embrace HS2 more positively.

I accept that if you *were* campaigning you would be taking it much more seriously.

I’m not sure of the meaning of ‘whataboutery’ but if you believe it is ‘irrelevant given that HS2 is currently being built whether we like it or not’ then why did you initiate a correspondence on the subject?

You have been either unwilling or too preoccupied to answer my questions so I will not comment further but (if anyone out there is reading this stuff) I will leave it to BFP readers to judge if you have sound reasons for supporting.

Lawrence Linehan, Wooburn Green