Sirs,
I read with interest the comments of Councillor Peggy Dow, the Independent candidate for the Wiltshire Council elections tomorrow, in today’s MNO.
Why the Wiltshire Electoral Officer has abdicated his responsibilities regarding the blatantly incorrect and misleading conservative claims of a “four year freeze” and “five year freeze” in council tax and passed the matter to the council’s solicitor, who has declined to get involved in a potentially serious matter, is staggering.
These individuals, required to be divorced from party politics, are effectively allowing the advertised claims to go unchallenged.
Interestingly, the Conservative candidates involved, have fallen silent on the matter.
And our elected MP Claire Perry? She has gone silent too, yet again.
Possibly not wanting to upset the Conservative Central Office, who are sticking to the “council tax freeze” headline, presumably in the belief that it will head off a substantial national loss of Conservative seats on councils.
Conservative Jane Scott, current leader of Wiltshire Council has, not unexpectedly, has failed to recognise the further damage this issue is doing to the public perception of politicians.
It seems as if all these individuals are representing only the declining number of Wiltshire Conservatives and not the rest of us.
Let’s see what the voters think about this tomorrow.
Yours,
David Thornton
Marlborough
