COUN Bluh takes a 'swipe' at my use of what he describes as a 'trite proverb' - when in a previous letter I challenged his assertion that the sum of £19,000 was not an insignificant amount to the people of Swindon. Indeed the point of my letter was to persuade him that many people understood what £19,000 related to whereas sums of money with lots of noughts were quite meaningless within the context of a normal household budget.

Moreover, many people actually practise the principle of the 'trite proverb' so disdainfully dismissed by Coun Bluh - the fact is that everyone, that is except Coun Bluh, understands that 'if you take care of the pennies the pounds will take care of themselves'. The people of Swindon do not believe him or his administration when they claim to have applied a fine tooth comb to the costs incurred in running the Council and they are not fooled by such meaningless twaddle as he offers up when he suggests that 'not offering visitors even a glass of water is not how this borough should proceed to solve the problem' - it's not a glass of water councillor it's an expense of £19,000 per annum. And in typical Bluh fashion he seeks to belittle a serious point by reducing it to a matter of pithy humour, something for which he is famed but does him little credit.

Perhaps he would accept some help in this matter. The Prime Minister invited Sir Philip Green to review expenditure within Government, I challenge Coun Bluh to allow an external audit of the Council's purchasing and spending policies - I for one would be more than willing to give freely of my time to assist in such an exercise.

Coun Bluh suggests that rhetoric and passion alone are no alternative to good policy; the operative word here is of course 'good' as in - good policy. The Leader of the Council of course thinks that any policy initiated by him or his elite group is by definition a 'good policy' and that anyone who dares to suggest otherwise is a fool, unrealistic or simply a denier of what is obviously correct. In short, Coun Bluh is so in thrall to his own sense of superiority that any opposition is dismissed using any means at his disposal. It is a credit to the thickness of his political skin that Coun Bluh is able to ignore the barbs of hostility towards his overbearing and condescending manner.

In the same edition as Coun Bluh's column appeared, the Adver published a letter from Coun Mark Dempsey. He applies a great deal of thought to his letter and his arguments have much to commend them. Sadly he falls into the same trap as Coun Bluh when he departs from logic and attempts to engage in political backbiting harking back to the days of Margaret Thatcher (at what point will Labour politicians realise that voters are not remotely interested in what she did or did not do over 25 years ago). Coun Dempsey blames the banks for the financial demise of 2007 refusing to even mention the spending policies of Gordon Brown - to use his own phrase, no wonder people lose such faith in politics.

He does raise an interesting point with regard to the subsidising of car parks and that of bus services. However, he then resorts to the very rhetoric so deprecated by Coun Bluh - using simplistic phrases such as -we need to learn, we need a plan, we need a university (why do we need a university?) and of course the ubiquitous 'it is hurting the young, children, the elderly and the vulnerable' as if the latter excludes the former but somehow covers every other grouping which may have been missed.

Coun Bluh may have a point about rhetoric and Coun Dempsey may have a point about the proposed budget - what typifies both councillors is their obsession with their own views and their belief that they are right. It doesn't augur well for the people of Swindon.

DES MORGAN Caraway Drive Swindon