BLACKBURN with Darwen Council have been pushing their 'Tenants' Involvement Charter' to build a working partnership between tenants and authorities, with the aim of improving benefits for all. Big deal!

In all the time I've attended our local tenants' association, two things have become apparent.

Firstly, our local councillors, Messrs Greenwood, Taylor and Kiani, of Audley, and Greenwood, Mulla and Husain, of Queens Park, do not want to know us.

Of all six who are eligible to attend, only Coun Mulla put in an appearance.

He had only been a councillor for a short while at the time. We can only assume he now knows how the rest do things.

The second thing that is apparent is that the council housing officials, who are also permanently invited to attend our monthly get-together have their own special problem - the officers change with a rapidity which defies description!

Some of them leave to better themselves, which is understandable, but the rest seem to be indulging in a sort of Lewis Carroll Caucus race where all the participants are winners and only poor souls, the tenants, are losers.

The only thing all these visitors agree on is that there is no money.

We've all paid our council tax in spite of the private sector's expressed belief that we don't. So where's it all gone?

You are all, councillors, housing officials, mayors, Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all, cordially invited to come and please explain the mystery. Perhaps with a bit of a natter the situation might be improved.

Go on, prove me wrong.

HARRY TALBOT (MR), resident, Lincoln Road Estate, Blackburn.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.