I SMILED when I read Adele Brolly's plea for a permanent ice-rink in York (Letters, January 21).

With our current Liberal Democrat council, York residents would have more chance of receiving an all-expenses paid trip to the moon. Look at the facts. The last major council-funded leisure facility built in our city was the Barbican Centre and we are all very aware of its fate under the current incumbents.

Just compare what we have with that of our close neighbours, as evidenced by the recent council-backed building of stadiums in Hull, Doncaster and Sheffield.

As for us, York Civil Service Club wasn't allowed to proceed with the building of a £7 million complex for fear of blocking a view of York Minster from an approach road a couple of miles out of the city centre. Do the readers of the Evening Press really think the council will spend funds on a potentially non-profit-making facility for York residents, when there is an opportunity to make money by putting up high-density housing which inevitably will become York's slums of the future?

Gary Flakes,

St Swithin's Walk,

Holgate, York.

Updated: 10:28 Friday, January 27, 2006