AND ANSWERS CAME THERE NONE!

It’s quite striking that week upon week through the generous auspices of the Editors of our various weekly papers; many correspondents quite rightly comment on and ask many questions of the council and its multitude of elected councillors. Conversely, it bemuses me that while a certain type of high profile, prolific political commentator will often – and quite rightly - be fairly forceful in stating their opinions in the local paper, they duck back behind the parapet whenever awkward questions are asked or adverse criticism is espoused.

Understandable perhaps, but what I can’t understand is why, when MPs and councillors are asked direct questions or criticised; especially when the readers’ comments are generally in response to matters initially raised by the councillors themselves, then more often or not, answers come there none!

If it’s the case that some councillors are not sufficiently erudite to confidently correspond comprehensively, surely they could find a qualified wordsmith from the council’s communications department to answer on their behalf. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time that a council member had called on their ‘ghost writers’ to bandy words with difficult, scholarly and discursive critics!

The result may not produce satisfactory answers; debate may not proceed productively; admittedly, debating though brutally edited copy can at times be unintelligent. Letters get started and then meander to ramblings; others engage in all manner of rhetorical tactics to deflect awkward interlocutors. But even on those occasions, when we are forced to decipher questionable standards of grammar; this would be preferable to silence, or simply being ignored as a way of obfuscation.

Last week, in Cllr Taylor’s weekly letter to the Ashtonians, paragraph 1, verse 1, he told us he was looking at some old photographs. Well with the greatest of respects, maybe his time would be better spent if put his old photo’s back in the drawer, took out his biro, and answered a few questions that refer to matters raised today - and do it personally! – After all, we’ve never seen him send an assistant or a 'stand-in' to a photo’ op, have we?