Evening Press readers' letters

There is great concern by people in York about proposals by the council to cut services. The interview with the Leader of the Council Rod Hills (February 9) was very helpful in explaining why any cuts are necessary.

However, the first point that should be established is what sort of services and what level of services are expected by the electorate.

Once this has been decided, then it must be up to those elected by the people of York to provide that standard on the most cost-effective basis. This means that all overhead costs should be scrutinised and that includes costs of councillors' expenses and committees as well as improving efficiency of the whole organisation. Then the cost of reaching standards required by the 'customers' can be established.

For my part, I think that we do receive value for money and if the services that we want are going to cost more then we must be prepared to pay - nobody else will. Even if we receive more from central government, that money originates from us as taxpayers.

JWM Wilson,

Chessingham Gardens,

York.

...Rodney Hills states that it is crystal clear that municipal swimming is dying a death - that people don't want to swim up and down pools, they want fun pools and dry activities. The number of petitioners signing up to keeping the Yearsley and Barbican pools open has now passed 10,000, Rodney.

I wonder which commercial operator told the council that fun pools were in and normal swimming was out? Having read the leisure planning documents which supposedly served as the basis for the council's deliberations, it is brutally apparent that there is scarcely a single fact in either of them. There are no local statistics which conclusively prove that attendance at either pools is in decline, despite the council's inability to provide decent maintenance for either.

Yearsley pool is 50 yards long and Barbican comprises two 25 metre pools. Having achieved a shortfall of a mere £4.7 million through its own incompetence, the council now proposes to shut down four-fifths of the normal conventional pool capacity available in York. This is the reality under the clouds of waffle being emitted from the council.

If you can't flog the pools, shut them. At this rate, this fine old city will soon resemble the shanty town capital of some third-world banana republic.

Richard Fox,

Aldwark,

York.

...Councillor Hills states that the lanes in the two Barbican pools are not used very much, rather most customers use the pools for pleasure (February 9).

If he would care to come along between 7 and 8am any weekday, he would see between ten and 20 people in the training pool, and more in the main pool, swimming between 15 and 50 lengths!

These figures refer to winter attendances and increase considerably between spring and autumn, augmented by visitors, students on various courses at the university, and people who call in on their way to work.

Neville Greaves,

Muncastergate,

York.

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