Madam,

I am a member of the Labour Party and have been for over 40 years. I intend to stand for the party again this year as the Labour candidate for Llangelynnin ward in the county council elections.

Cuts and the way Gwynedd spends its money are, and will be, the main issues for the voters.

We must guard against the Plaid-run Gwynedd Council using the results of its ‘Gwynedd Challenge’ survey of last year to justify unnecessary cuts.

Simple arithmetic using the figures given in the survey, shows that, then, the council planned to leave itself with a surplus greater than the cuts it proposed. Why was it proposing cutting services it had the money for?

Now that the Labour government has made such a generous grant to Gwynedd, expansion of services rather than any cuts is feasible.

That grant, plus efficiency savings, plus extra revenue from second homes, plus Plaid Gwynedd’s acknowledgement of its own mistaken financial calculations, is sufficient for us here in Gwynedd to fight Tory austerity and their Brexit incompetencies with a programme of social provision here that will nurture and strengthen the people of the county.

Yours etc,

Ian MacIntyre, Shelbourne Court, St Johns Hill, Barmouth.

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