I am writing in response to the letter from Cllr Anstee in which he claims the comments I made in the article concerning the state of street scene services cannot be corroborated or evidenced, this is completely untrue and disingenuous and he knows this and I will give a few examples highlighting these concerns.

Last autumn we raised serious concerns about the leaf clearance programme, despite my colleagues and I complaining about the complete lack of any service in the Stretford and Old Trafford areas it took four weeks from the commencement of this work before any resources were deployed in these areas. I had a number of special meetings with high level officers at Trafford Town Hall to discuss these serious concerns.

In addition to this I personally witnessed a conversation between Cllr Anstee and a senior Amey officer in which he told Cllr Anstee very clearly that Trafford Council had grossly underestimated the tonnage of leaves involved with this work, so it would seem quite clear this is corroborated.

I regularly attend the ‘Friends of Parks’ meetings and hear the genuine and ongoing concerns about the ‘clear deterioration’ in parks from Old Trafford to Hale, and as Cllr Anstee also attends these meetings and hears these complaints this is also corroborated and documented.

The disastrous weed spraying programme this year was a real concern to senior officers and they have taken this up with Amey and were arranging special meetings to discuss this, areas around Stretford and Urmston got into a dreadful state including the Cenotaph in Stretford and there are questions as to why this was allowed to happen, this again is clearly documented.

I could go on and give numerous other examples, however I have made my point and all that I said is factual and truthful and Cllr Anstee needs to accept there are genuine concerns and problems across the our communities and instead of rubbishing these concerns he should be looking to addressing and resolving these problems.

Cllr Steve Adshead
Labour Shadow Member for Environment & Economic Growth