In North Somerset Council’s own paper North Somerset Life, Cllr Ashton expressed delight on the 3-star rating for Adult Social Services and the equally good report for Children & Young People’s Services. He implied that these results were due to the period of Conservative control from May last year.

I too am delighted with these results. However, to set the record straight, these inspections covered the year from summer 2006 to summer 2007, most of it under the joint Lib Dem & Labour Executive and Cllr Ashton should have made this clear.

Of course all good work builds on what goes before, and the present excellent results reflect the efforts of staff and councillors from all Parties over previous years. In the 4 years from May 2003 to May 2007 the Council had no overall political majority and this produced several different Executives – joint Conservative & Lib Dem for 2 ½ years, then Lib Dems alone for 11 months before the final 7 months of joint Lib Dem and Labour.

I understand that NS Life is not allowed to promote any political Party since it is funded by North Somerset Council, and so I wrote to NS Life to point this out. I have just heard that Cllr Ashton will not allow my letter to be printed. This is disappointing since NS Life is supposed to speak for the whole Council and not just the Conservatives.

Yours sincerely

Cllr Deborah Yamanaka
Liberal Democrat Group Leader

published by: North Somerset Liberal Democrats, 12 Henley Lodge, Yatton, Bristol, BS49 4JQ

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