WE are told that we have the second lowest council tax in the Greater Manchester area, while we think that we have the second lowest quality of services. Yet with inflation at around 2.5 per cent, our councillors have the audacity to increase council tax by 11.7 per cent and that after awarding themselves a 50 per cent hike in their allowances!
"Services" include refuse collectors who make up their own rules to benefit themselves; social service managers who bring in new schemes costing thousands of pounds, only for them to be discarded as unworkable; council employees who don't do their jobs and treat the people who pay their wages (council tax-payers) with little or no respect; rules and regulations which make some social services virtually redundant; "asylum-seekers" being provided with accommodation and education when our own homeless people don't get the same; litter everywhere and overflowing litter bins (when you can find one). Need we go on?
The borough engineers were contacted in July 2002 and informed about a tree, the roots of which are damaging a wall. A hole has been dug in the footpath, forcing pedestrians to walk into the busy main road, and the hole is now filled with beer cans and rubbish. Nothing has been done about the tree. Maybe when a tragedy occurs as a result of people having to walk into the road, something will be done.
Pages could be written about this council's incompetence, so come on Councillor Campbell, don't preach to us about how we should be viewing this tax increase, or tell us that percentage rises are not important. We can all see the deterioration in services supplied by Bury Council, along with the annual hike in tax levels.
Isn't it about time Coun Campbell took a good look at the council, its structure and the work of its employees, starting from the top, and the way services are implemented? He might find that council tax could be reduced and ratepayers given value for money.
If the council was a private company it would have been bankrupt years ago!
UNHAPPY BURY
RATEPAYERS
ASSOCIATION
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