OUTRAGED! Shame! Morally repugnant! Exploitative! How ever many more ways can the readers of your paper put into words you can print, about the ways those horrible circus people treat their animals? I would just like to ask how many wordy readers have a

OUTRAGED! Shame! Morally repugnant! Exploitative! How ever many more ways can the readers of your paper put into words you can print, about the ways those 'horrible' circus people treat their animals?

I would just like to ask how many wordy readers have actually seen circus people ill-treating a horse, dog, arthritic elephant? I could go on.

Some years age while serving in the fire service we were called out to circus animals in distress on Saffron Walden Common. When we arrived we found a large number of people ferrying buckets of water and sponging down a variety of large animals, which were suffering from heat exhaustion due to the high summer temperature.

I saw men and women near exhaustion with their efforts, telling horses, llamas etc. not to worry, the firemen were there and they would now be alright.

Some of those 'cruel' circus people had tears in their eyes at seeing their animals suffering. This was the same reaction I had witnessed from horse riders, faced with their beloved horse stuck fast in a water filled ditch, or a cat owner after we retrieved their pet from down a well, or dog down a hole, or wild birds fallen down a chimney, and the family of the house relieved when the bird was able to fly away.

What about dressage horses? They must be beaten something horrible, to be trained to walk backwards, sideways, stepping to music, and what about sheepdogs trained to chase other animals? That must be cruel.

Police dogs - now there is a dog that must be thrashed in its training, jumping fences, chasing robbers, sniffing out explosives and drugs, and what about the police horse? I bet they are thrashed within an inch of their life.

I have yet to read that the people in your letters to the editor page have actually witnessed the circus people harming an animal, and if they did what did they do about it?

I have witnessed caring people; obviously I don't know what happens behind closed doors.

Give the council some ammunition to use, don't keep bleating like sheep, if there is this much cruelty taking place by circus animal trainers.

I am an animal lover and have had dogs that loved to perform all sorts of tricks for me, and not once did I have to beat them; they just wanted to please me.

Sorry to go on but PUT UP OR SHUT UP.

Paul Start, Saffron Walden