Seeing red over cost of going green

SIR – At a recent event, we visited a stall by Beds County Council telling us about the benefits of recycling and home composting, and offering compost bins (Komp 250) at the reduced cost of £40 plus £4 for a handy bin.

Great, I thought, we will get one of those! However, with a little bit of browsing on the dreaded internet I was surprised to find the same bin offered by Aylesbury County Council for £20 including a free handy bin! Edinburgh bettered this at just £15.

Great stuff Bedfordshire, you charge one of the highest council taxes in the country and still want to make money out of an environmental issue.

John Carass
High View,
Bedford

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Traveller problem should be high priority for police

SIR – Again the illegal travellers are running rings round the authorities and costing the taxpayer money, which could be spent on any number of other things rather than this recurring problem.

Why do we never read in the papers of the police raiding these sites and checking every vehicle for road tax and car insurance? Why do we never see a picture of one of their vehicles being towed away to be crushed? Is every vehicle legal or is this a low priority for the police's stretched resources?

I have e-mailed the Bedfordshire Police Authority this question but after at least a week had no reply. Maybe answering emails from
concerned members of the public is also low on their priority list.

Paul Seigh
Mepham Road, Wootton

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Tory government made travellers 'homeless'

SIR – I have heard it said that making derogatory comments about gypsies and travellers is "the last acceptable form of racism in this country". Judging by the front page article in last week's Times &
Citizen, it would seem that Coun Mingay certainly subscribes to this view. According to Big Brother John, some people's human rights are more important than others.

Unfortunately, what he failed to say was that it is largely the fault of his party that we are now faced with the problem of so many illegal encampments. In 1996 the Tory government removed the responsibility from local authorities for providing sites for the travelling community, thereby making the majority of them effectively
homeless.

To its credit the current Labour Government has grasped this
particular nettle and is obliging each local council to provide a certain number of pitches by 2011.

Once these are in place the police and local authorities will have much greater powers to move on those who stop in unauthorised places.
As for Bedford Borough Council 'throwing the towel in', Coun Mingay knows that this is most certainly not the case. In the last year the community and culture committee which he and I both sit on has endorsed a new enforcement policy which outlines the correct legal procedures for moving gypsy and travellers off council-owned land, supported a bid for additional funding to undertake further protective measures and urged council officers to find emergency stopping places or transit sites to help solve the problem in the short term.

Coun Sue Oliver (Lab)
Loveridge Avenue, Kempston

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MPs in glass houses shouldn't throw stones

SIR – Following the latest attack by Patrick Hall (T&C, May 29),
accusing Bedford Borough Council of failing in its duty to implement an entirely new unitary authority, I feel obliged to respond on his clear
implication that the council should abandon its present officer structure and his discussion of salary ranges being excessive.

As I pointed out at the meeting of the Implementation Executive last week, I asked the Chief Executive whether the Mayor had written to the Minister John Healey placing before him what we intended to do.

It was confirmed that not only had the Mayor written on those terms, but John Healey had written back that he had approved of every
measure we were taking and reminded us of a meeting with him where he had stressed the importance of retaining all staff who had delivered 'excellent' status for this council.

Therefore, I have a couple of questions for Mr Hall.

Does he therefore disagree with what his own minister confirmed to us regarding our staffing structure? And is he saying that Mr Healey is wrong?

Does he believe that, at a sensitive time for staff of both authorities, who may be fearful for their future, it is right to attack the council when we are trying to implement changes to services in a very short time?

Finally, people in glass houses really shouldn't throw stones.

Coun Nicky Attenborough
Conservative group leader,
Bedford Borough Council

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Passenger power wins on route 6

SIR – In response to the letters recently from Mr McMillan, 'Nic' the driver, Mr Blakeman and Mr Lennon regarding route 6 in the town centre, I am pleased to inform them that we are splitting the route from
September.

We are unable to control the massive congestion and constant roadworks that affect this route and the simple fact is that we tried to split service 6 to sort out the issues in October last year, but after a
public consultation in July we had a lot of people (including an MP) telling us not to split it – so we didn't.

In hindsight this was a mistake, but we were listening to our
travelling public at the time who overwhelmingly told us not to split it.

As for Mr Lennon's comment on not communicating with our travelling public – we have a travel shop in the bus station open six days a week; we have one timetable booklet with every timetable in – plus a town network map – again available in the travel shop and around the town.

We will be improving the information still further from September by introducing a bus station and key stops in the town centre map.

Also in September, we are considering changing the routing onto Bromham Road and into Union Street on the journeys operating via the rail station, as suggested by Mr Lennon.

We understand we are not perfect but are planning to make alterations to route 6 to make it work, and feedback from our customers and drivers is key to us understanding the issues that occur on a daily basis.

Michelle Hargreaves
Operations director, Stagecoach

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Comments which are just a waste of time

SIR – I was disappointed to read Coun Headley's political stampede last weekend over the Implementation Executive's recent discussion of waste treatment in the borough.

Cutting the amount of waste going to landfill is a global issue that
politicians should be working together to change, and attacks by Coun Headley on the "Tory-run county council" are not helpful.

Coun Headley goes on to claim wildly that we all agreed to a "Lib Dem proposal".

The truth is the officers had already recommended in their report that "the procurement process should consider encouraging the submission of a full range of technological solutions, including Mechanical Biological Treatment."

Perhaps this goes to show just how out of touch the Lib Dems are with the vast majority of residents who, I believe, want to see debate on waste treatment conducted fairly, openly, free of political bias and party allegiance and along strict lines of common sense.

Coun Robert Rigby
(Con) Bromham

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Pigeons should deserve more respect

SIR – I read with great interest of SJ Tidd's kindness (T&C, June 5) to a pigeon found by hearing dog Pip in a wheelie bin in St Paul's Square.
I have many times rescued injured pigeons and taken them to the vet.

They are a bird of the dove family. During the two world wars the lives of many servicemen were saved by these brave birds who flew through enemy lines and often terrible weather with messages of where a plane had been shot down or a boat sunk.

In 1943 the Dickin Medal was introduced for animals which had shown bravery in wartime; 32 were won by pigeons.

Sadly they now have a new name – rats with wings – and are greatly
disliked by the public.

Name and address supplied

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Lack of openness is risk to council's reputation

SIR – The preference of Bedford Borough Council's new Implementation Executive for excluding the public and the press from its meetings is very disturbing. This happened again at its meeting last week when staffing matters were discussed.

The council properly has a duty of confidentiality in relation to matters affecting individual members of staff. However, the principles
underpinning the council's decisions on these matters must be kept under public scrutiny. Sadly, on this occasion, other groups rejected a
Liberal Democrat proposal for matters not involving personal details to be dealt with publicly.

If we continue to exclude the public, they will still learn what is going on, but only by a combination of leaks and innuendo. This can only be seriously damaging to the council's reputation for
accountability and transparency.

Coun David Sawyer
Lib Dem, De Parys ward
Bedford Borough Council

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How sustainable is new eco-town proposal?

SIR – Your report 'County says no to eco-towns' (T&C, June 5) mistakenly suggests 150,000 new homes are proposed. This is obviously a typing error – the figure is closer to 15,000 (up to 16,000).

You suggest that the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) has already announced its opposition. This is misleading, as the
Bedfordshire branch has not even submitted any comments to the
Government as yet. CPRE is naturally keen on the principle of eco-towns if properly sustainable for otherwise we would appear to oppose sustainable living and to deny the future impact of climate change.

As an environmental charity we are indeed aware of the issues. We are, however, very concerned as to how truly sustainable the Marston Vale proposals are.

We would encourage individuals and parish councils to respond to the
consultation which ends on June 30. In doing so they should assess the proposals against national CPRE's ten tests and also address a number of points the Bedfordshire branch has raised relevant to the local
proposals.

Ann Collett-White and Martin Towlson
CPRE Bedfordshire branch

Editor's note: Our apologies – the mistake was indeed a simple typing error.

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Unhelpful tax burden on green projects

SIR – I read with interest your article regarding Bedford College producing bio diesel. However, I found the article a little
misleading and amusing.

ABAKO Ltd is a commercial bio diesel producer in the Bedford area and as such we would find it hard to produce fuel at a price of £0.30. I say this as a commercial producer. It is possible to produce fuel at this price if one is producing domestically and not paying for the feedstock oil or any of the duties and taxes associated with it that the Government imposes, nor taking into consideration the depreciation of the equipment needed, costs of workshop or that of wages, to name just some areas of the business to be paid for.

While our current Government is making all the right noises about going green, by taxing this fledgling industry it is certainly not helping it to establish itself or grow.

With the current high costs of fuel, it is forcing many companies and people to manufacture under cover, not declaring what they are
producing and not paying the associated taxes. Furthermore, many of those producing bio diesel under cover really do not understand how to manufacture quality fuel; the result of which could be damaged engines and a bed reputation for the fuel and industry.

I wish Bedford College every success in its venture, but if it
investigates deeply enough the implications, it will see that all is not what it appears, with many obstacles in the way.

Name and address supplied

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Too many options left on the back burner

SIR – The county council's Cabinet member for waste, Coun Tom Wootton, is correct when he says "there have always been a number of options" for waste disposal in Bedfordshire (T&C, June 5). The problem, of course, has been the county council's refusal to give serious
consideration to any of them other than incineration.

Coun Judith Cunningham
Lib Dem, Wootton and Stewartby
Bedford Borough Council

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Policy on recycling is just rubbish

SIR – In reply to the letter 'Confused over recycling – you will be' (T&C, June 5), it would be helpful to know why some plastic items should be 'orange-bagged' but plastic bags, margarine tubs and yoghurt pots et al should be 'black-binned'.

After all, it is said that to rubbish-dump plastic bags is by no means ideal because they take years to disintegrate and, moreover, are a hazard to birds which peck them and thus often choke to death.

AH Green
The Buntings, Bedford

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Proud of club's achievements

SIR – May I through your columns thank all the 'backroom' staff of Clapham Football Club after a great season which saw two teams gaining promotion.

We are all proud of them, their dedication is an example to all and their success is of immense satisfaction to all running the club. But not only have we a flourishing football club but two young boys who ran in the London mini marathon 2008.

We hear so many bad things about the young today but we have some smashing young lads at the club and all credit to them.

K Booker
High Street, Clapham

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Beware the car park 'hit and run'

SIR – Last Saturday, June 7, around midday, a blue Volvo hit my car while I was parked in a disabled parking bay at the Tesco car park in Goldington.

On hitting my new car, the man stopped, got out, looked at the damage and drove off.

Fortunately, I have a witness who kindly took a photograph and recorded the car registration number. My thanks and appreciation go to this young man.

I am now left with paying the insurance excess of £250 to get the car repaired.

Name and address supplied