More litter police in town are just window dressing

He doesn’t let go, does he? Mr Quinn seems pretty determined to cram a further 750 homes into our green and pleasant land, faced with KCC’s sensible opposition to the scheme to build yet more dwellings.

Tucked away in one corner of the scheme is a tiny plot derisorily labelled ‘parkland’.

Hold on a minute – the whole area could at present be realistically called parkland, or good open countryside at least.

Quinn Estates say they’ve worked in Ashford for many years. They really should understand that a few tweaks to the road network, causing even more chaos is not what the people of Ashford want. Gerry Clarkson and his gang work hard at selling Ashford as the nearest place there is to heaven on earth. They don’t mention the congested roads or the town centre’s myriad barber shops, nor do they advertise the depressingly high incidence of crime and antisocial behaviour in the area.

Last week, it was revealed that, in Victoria ward alone, there were 747 violent or sexual offences recorded last year, which accounted for

30.8% of the 2,429 crimes committed in the ward over the period. That’s a fearsome amount of crime in such a small area of a small(ish) country town. Would I be the only one to believe that, the more houses that are built, with no real provision for our disaffected youth, the more likely it is that more offences will be committed. Having a couple of litter police wandering around might make the council a few bob and reduce the number of fag ends left in the High Street for Neil and the other chaps who pick up rubbish and empty the litter bins to deal with but, seriously, isn’t this just window dressing?

For some reason, the binmen in our area have altered the collection schedule given out by the council. When the chart which we downloaded and printed shows that it’s recycling week, our general refuse bin gets emptied. But, at least the bins do get emptied, so who cares in which order the job’s done?

‘A few tweaks to the road network is not what the people of Ashford want’