Madam,

It may surprise your readers to learn that Machynlleth Town Council’s Extraordinary Meeting held on 16 January to discuss “budgeting matters” was advertised by the council as being “in committee”, thus excluding the press and council tax payers from listening to their elected representatives discussing the astronomic 18.7 per cent rise in the precept.

I cannot recall a similar decision during my time as a councillor. Such meetings were quite rightly held in public.

Ultimately it is the mayor who calls meetings and decides on their status, so why opt to hide the council behind closed doors to discuss the allocation of public funds? What is it that was too sensitive and confidential for the ears of the people who would end up footing the bill for such an increase?

The mayor explains the increase as partly due to having to fund “contingencies”, a word defined as “things that might happen in the future, making further plans and arrangements necessary”. So by this very definition, the council could not possibly be in a position to estimate how much of an increase this should represent, unless, of course, part of our taxes are to be spent purchasing a crystal ball!

He claims that none of the increase is due to the council’s decision to take over the running of a cafe in Y Plas. Is this strictly correct?

By his own admission, in earlier reports in the Cambrian News, there has been a legal wrangle with the cafe’s previous occupants for over two years.

How much have those legal fees amounted to thus far? How much did they eat into past reserves? Are there more legal fees to come? And, crucially, who is paying them? The council tax payer? Or will they be recouped from the wonderfully self-financing cafe’s takings? Maybe that is what is meant by “contingencies”? If so, recourse to a dictionary may be in order.

I am afraid that sometimes the mayor and his council need to reflect and remember that they are the town’s servants and we the residents must be treated with respect. How respectful is it to exclude us from meetings which heap such a financial burden on so many people and then offer us such mealy-mouthed explanations for their decisions?

The mayor’s explanation of the precept increase would be laughable if it were not so inept. Is it really a good idea to treat the residents his council should be serving with such contempt.

Yours etc,

Gareth Jones, Trem yr Allt, Machynlleth.

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