WE HAVE TO PAY FOR LIB DEM LIGHT POLLUTION - Letter (27/01/05)

Not content with littering our countryside with unnecessary road furniture (which they now have to take down again, at considerable expense to the taxpayer), the Lib Dem administration at Somerset County Hall also insist on polluting our skies with completely over-the-top street lighting.

There is no duty on the Council to provide public lighting, but in many cases it is in the interests of residents that the Council does so. Unfortunately the Lib Dems, ever eager to spend other people's money, seem to erect street lights wherever conceivable and to the fullest extent possible.

Once the street lighting is installed, often in the face of local opposition, the Council becomes duty bound to maintain it at further, unnecessary cost to the taxpayer, and Somerset's skies are filled with light pollution.

If only the Lib Dems were so bright, the Council Tax bill would not soar quite so much each year.

John Smeaton,
Conservative Environment & Transport Spokesman, Somerset County Council