Your story ‘Where are the lawyers?’ (Times Series, October 9) draws attention to the parlous state of local government in our borough under the current administration.
The report of an independent lawyer stated that mistakes were a fault of Barnet’s governance team.
Governance is a term that has crept into the English language in recent years.
It seems to hide a multitude of procedures or, perhaps in the case of Barnet, sins. At the last election, the Conservatives made much of talk of savings and localism. However, these have turned out to be what they always were intended to be – cuts and neglect.
In fact, we have a very right wing Government. It believes in the ‘small state’ and the eternal promise of ‘low taxes’. What this means is abandoning any pretence at supervising the correct administration of local government and any hope of local government being properly financed.
Cuts across the entire sweep of public services have not been forced upon us as a result of the financial crash. They are quite deliberate.
And a consequence of this, according to your report, is a series of blunders that concluded that nobody at the authority understands local government law and staff in key roles are inexperienced.
In the long lost days of town clerks, the appointees were often legally qualified. Perhaps our myopic Conservative administration will now see why.
David Beere
Colin Crescent, Colindale
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