I choked on my tea when I read Brighton and Hove could become "one of the world's premier centres for international education" (The Argus, November 9).

For one teary-eyed moment, I thought someone was going to do something about our schools and youth services.

Ah no, silly me. It's the money-making sort of schools they meant, not the ones local kids go to.

It's also nice to know our language schools "conform to the image of Brighton and Hove as tolerant, international and friendly".

Tell that to the schoolkids here, especially those who travel up to Varndean and Stringer on the 5B who are routinely subjected to misery by bullies before they even start their lessons.

Bullying wrecks even the best of educations and, despite the wonderful image of Brighton and Hove as a young, vibrant and tolerant millennium city, it does real damage in schools buried so far down the league tables as to be lost in the crowd.

And with our local youth services in the bottom five nationally, there is no help available to try to undo the damage.

The place is stiff with creative, socially-conscious people yet once our own kids stop being cute there is nothing doing for them.

Families in trouble with schools and their bullies have no one to turn to.

We should be leading the country in youth development. We should have brilliant schemes other cities would love to copy.

Brighton and Hove should be a great place in which to grow up. I look forward to the day The Argus reports something is being done for Brighton and Hove's kids - and not just the sweet little ones.

-Monica Moore, Robert Street, Brighton