No investment

COUNCILLOR Ursell's response to my remarks on the swimming pool situation in St Neots (Letters, December 19) is characteristically wrong or misleading on every single point.

First, the reason why the swimming pool in Huntingdon Street was filled in had less to do with insurance and much more to do with the fact that our local Tory council didn't invest a penny in it over the years. Indeed, the exact same thing has happened to our other swimming pool on the Ernulf site. The local Tories have invested nothing in it for years and yes that has deteriorated too. Now 30,000 people will have no public swimming pool for six months.

It's not atomic physics - if you don't invest in and maintain a public amenity properly, it deteriorates.

Secondly, Councillor Ursell immediately contradicts himself: "The pool was not bought by the people of St Neots through public subscription....it is true that some of the money came from public subscription."

Thirdly, the site has been sold to developers and he knows that additional housing will be built in the Almond Road area, probably on the site of the existing regional college campus.

Fourthly, on the back of a woeful lack of investment by the local council in public amenities, and the fact that at the moment our town has no public swimming pool at all, I don't think I am alone in having no confidence whatsoever in Councillor Ursell's capacity to bring a new swimming pool to St Neots.

Fifthly, Councillor Ursell is quite wrong to suggest that I was attempting to score points for the Labour Party. My comments were driven entirely by a genuine desire to see more and better public amenities for the town.

BILL O'CONNOR

Chamberlain Way

St Neots