THE rather dyspeptic letter from Mr S Williams' (Citizen, last week) asks for more accountability and information on specific points. Well, I believe in accountability too, so here goes.

1 City Contract Services: Mr Williams refers to 'massive losses'. He is out of date. The coalition Cabinet inherited a massive under-performance by CCS but members and officers have put in a lot of work since May 2003 and I am glad to report we have turned things round. In 2003/04, CCS came in £271,000 above target - a pretty dramatic improvement.

2 The Millennium Bridge: This is a leftover from the previous administration but we cannot attach blame to anyone within the council. Extra work was needed before the county would adopt the bridge and take over maintenance. Normally this would be the responsibility of contractors but they are no longer in business. Rather than pay expensive lawyers with no certainty of a finding someone to take responsibility, we have taken the view that it would be cheaper to just to get the work done.

3 Top Officer Salaries: Mr Williams is wrong again if he believes there has been a big increase in total remuneration, there hasn't. Nor has there been the big increase in members' allowances, which are decided by an independent panel.

4 New Staff Appointments: There is no permanent freeze and I never said there was. What did happen was that, in the run up to the March 2004 budget, all vacancies were subject to detailed scrutiny by myself and the chief executive before they could be filled. However, that was a short term expedient and a modified system is now in place.

5 New Staff Accommodation: Mr Williams doesn't specify but I assume he means the move of the housing department from Dalton Square to Cable Street. Again, this was a problem we inherited. Dalton Square was structurally unsound and ended up being both internally and externally propped.

6 Partnerships: Mr Williams makes the obvious point that the council's arrangements with Noel Edmunds were a disaster. But that was precisely the wrong sort of partnership and you can be absolutely sure I would not countenance any such arrangement in the future.

Finally, can I make a more general point. Mr Williams and others who write to the papers contrive to imply that council staff are uniquely undeserving idle bureaucrats or lazy workmen. They are not.

They are an easy target, but on the whole, they are the council's best asset and have been undervalued for too long.

Cllr Ian Barker, Leader, Lancaster City Council.