6:30pm Tuesday 30th June 2009
By ivor
The other day I arrived home to find a leaflet on the black box recycling scheme pushed through my door. Apparently a neighbour told me that a delivery person had been round with the leaflets.
A few days later yet another leaflet was put through the door. This leaflet was entitled “Imagine the future 5… Delivering the strategy for Wycombe”
That’s two separate deliveries made on two separate days all of which are paid for from the Council Tax. I just could not believe how inefficient the delivery process is.
Surely it would have been possible to have sent one person round to deliver both the leaflets at the same time and saved the tax payer money? Is there no coordination or concern for cost at our town hall?
The size of a tabloid paper and printed in full colour the IF5 leaflet contained information on the future development of Wycombe. The front page article says how the complex has been the biggest change in Wycombe for years and how it has been a positive catalyst for the area.
A positive catalyst? I could not believe the choice of words especially when you consider how the shops moved overnight leaving the old part of town desolate and covered in “To Let” signs. On page five of the leaflet the presence of the empty shops is blamed on the economic downturn.
The IF5 leaflet says plans to fill the empty shops in the “historic core” of the town (i.e. around White Hart Street and Church Square) involve allowing businesses to set up in certain parts of Wycombe “without even going through the red tape of applying for planning permission”.
If the areas of town concerned were attractive business would have set up there long ago and waiving the planning permission process is not going to alter the profitability and create sustainable businesses.
The trouble isn’t caused by planning permission. No. The trouble was caused when our town centre had its heart ripped out thanks to the infernal complex providing more retail space than is required.
Amazingly the leaflet is splattered with headlines like “High Wycombe: A town ready for the next upturn” and “Building a sustainable Wycombe”. I am not fooled by the slogans or management speak.
In order to get ready for the upturn very little apart from cosmetic window dressing seems to be planned.
What makes me angry it that people are working their fingers to the bone earning the minimum wage to pay their Council Tax while the powers that be are squandering the money earned on delivering these silly leaflets to our houses in an inefficient manner.
Have you had an IF5 leaflet? What did you think to it?
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