THIS weeks Redditch Standard’s letters.
THE REDDITCH Conservatives were elected to take control of the borough council in May 2018 on the slogan of ‘Unlock Redditch’.
I would suggest they were elected on a false premise.
Their record on bidding for Government funds has been woefully inadequate.
They bid for £25million of Towns Fund support but were £9.6million short at £15.4million, £4.2million of which has been put forward to pursue the vanity project of demolishing the town library – a project overwhelmingly opposed by residents.
They are now having to find an additional £5.2million to refurbish the Town Hall to accommodate a library service that is being delivered without a problem in its current location.
That funding will be found by a further demolition of the Community House in Easemore Road thus depriving many popular voluntary groups including the Gemini Dance Troupe of a central Redditch facility.
They then submitted a £20million Levelling-Up bid for the regeneration of Winyates and Matchborough centres. Again, they failed in this bid and despite the pleadings of the local MP Rachel Maclean Redditch has been levelled down again.
Having reviewed the document provided to the elected councillors in support of the bid, I am not surprised that the Government gave it short shrift. It lacked detail, was uncosted and was more of a wish-list than a detailed submission that would pass scrutiny for such a large amount of taxpayers’ money.
The Redditch Conservatives have twice caused the borough embarrassment by being the subject of the Independent Auditor’s Section 24 notices due to their failure to manage the council finances.
They have pursued the deeply unpopular raiding of public open space at Ipsley Meadow for a new cemetery.
Some may say that the Conservatives have lost the key to ‘Unlocking Redditch’, I would suggest that the lock is seized, and the door of opportunity has been slammed in the faces of the Redditch community by these Conservative Party failures.
The voters of Redditch may wish to consider that ‘there is an alternative’ in the May 4 local elections and that the only alternative is the Labour Party.
P Berry, Redditch
LET ME put the cat among the pigeons.
Jason Caddick is a fool, stating the government should put more money into the NHS.
You cannot put money into a dead system.
The people of today are to blame for the broken NHS because they abuse it,
We have a society of undisciplined ‘me, me, me’ first, second and last – a society that is wet-nursed and seems to think they have a right to everything but ignore their responsibilities.
There was no welfare when I was a child and poverty was real, not imagined. We lived with vermin, had to scavenge for food, had no running water or heating and I was a motherless child – she died giving birth to me in the 1930s – the days of the depression.
It was a case of ‘live or die’ – we had to struggle but had to develop character and self-esteem, which we did.
In this day of handouts for everything, it has cultivated a lazy, selfish, ‘get out of my way’ society.
In fact there is no society. I will tell you who is to blame for our fractured broken services – the people of today, themselves, are to blame.
We have been given so much but people are not satisfied – they demand more.
Society in general is to blame – malingerers.
They have – or are – in the process of ‘killing the golden goose’ because they think only of themselves.
The golden goose has laid the golden egg because of welfare.
But unless we respect and take care of our privileged lifestyle, we have to realise we are doomed to a ‘dog eat dog’ and a ‘me first’ society.
I know for a fact there are people who can afford to go private but prefer to milk the NHS so those who need it don’t get a look-in.
The doctors in my day would have sent you on your way with your silly so-called ‘maladies’.
We need to get some backbone – your cosy life is a privilege – respect it.
Others in the world are not so lucky.
Also to blame are those who clutter the A&E with nonsensical trivia – taking doctors’ time and energy away from the really ill people who need it.
An ex nurse of 50 years
Redditch
THREE points if I may.
Firstly, congratulations on getting ‘Led Zep’ into a headline. Even if I didn’t always grab a Standard that would have done it!
Secondly, the introduction of photographic ID for voting is just another example of the obsessive intrusiveness we have had foisted on us in recent years.
I have shoulder length hair. By May I would have probably had a buzz cut so any photo taken now would be useless by then.
Are men not allowed to grow/shave off beards? Can no-one dye their hair? Change their glasses? The effect of introducing this will be to deter people from voting, which conceivably was the aim.
Finally, I would point out to Malcolm Jones that the land grab of part of AVP for a cemetery sets a dangerous precedent and it will be an operational cemetery not a peaceful churchyard.
It is also the most attractive part of the park.
Nowhere else in the park is quite like it for combining views with spaciousness.
The lake has the former not the latter and some other parts the latter not the former but only Ipsley Meadow has both.
K Wass
Matchborough
