A casual look out of the window of the Courier offices in Hamilton Terrace will tell any self respecting traffic engineer that somebody got it wrong as he surveys the empty parking spaces.

If further confirmation is needed, there are numerous further examples of under-utilisation of sensible parking spaces while conversely there are numerous instances of parking in less sensible places. The clogging up of Coventry Road, Warwick being a prime example.

Quite clearly those who should know better have failed to take Archimede's principle into account. In this particular case it dictates that those displaced by cost or regulation must find somewhere else to park. The regulations need an urgent review and consequent changes. An immediate change should be made to reduce restricted times to 6pm from 8pm, which was always an obvious mistake.

Public concern over parking has been totally overtaken by the proposed changes to domestic waste disposal arrangements. This apparent mute response to the increased parking charges is explainable as like having a painful left foot and dropping a full wheelie bin on the right foot.
The instant pain in the right foot makes one forget the pain in the left foot. Eventually one realises that both feet hurt.

I live in the Stratford district and have yet to discover what wheelie bin arrangements may or may not be imposed on this 67-year-old who would need to bump any wheelie bin down 14 concrete steps. I can hope, but optimism is not excessive.

Clearly we do have enormous problems with both traffic and waste disposal and frankly many more issues that should not be ignored and will not go away.

To be fair to our often beleagured local authorities many of the basic policy decisions and contentious implementation achieve their momentum from Whitehall and Brussels and have little to do with local democracy.
It always used to be assumed that any democratically elected government that did not carry the broad thrust of public opinion with it would inevitably fall at any subsequent election.

This is not inevitably the case any longer simply because there is not a mainstream party that is prepared to largely represent what they truly believe are the wishes of the majority of the citizens of this country.

Therein lies a threat to democracy itself which Sir Winston Churchill described as 'the worst form of government other than all the alternatives'.

I sometimes feel that our governments could have been better led by Ted Heath the band leader than old 'Shaky Shouldered Europe obsessed'.
Ted Heath the Prime Minister (1970-1974) and in more recent times Lionel Blair the dancer may have achieved less damage than Tony Blair. I jest - but only just! - John Pearce, Church Road, Lighthorne.