IT IS, of course, very easy for Cllr Hodgkinson to criticise Cotswold District Council's parking income from the comfort of an opposition without any financial responsibility.

The history of Lib Dems’ actions when they do have to control budgets paints a somewhat different picture. At Government level there was Nick Clegg’s famously abrupt about–turn on his pre-election promise not to increase tuition fees. When he had sight of government finances, he quickly realised his pledge could not be afforded.

At a local level, at this stage of the 2011 district election run-in, we had Lib Dem petitions and protests campaigning to double the number of monitored hours for Cirencester’s CCTV, yet when Lib Dem run Cirencester Town Council took on that responsibility for CCTV, all talk of increasing the hours stopped dead, again, presumably, when they realised the cost.

In fact Cllr Harris, who was particularly active in the campaign, was quoted last week, that the cost of merely retaining the existing level of monitoring was a contributory factor in raising next year’s town precept.

If we look at parking, Cllr Hodgkinson only needs to drive a few minutes from his Churn Valley ward to see how Lib Dem controlled Cheltenham run their parking. The tariffs in all their town centre car parks are higher than Cirencester’s, all include Sunday charging, whereas in Cirencester the only Sunday charging is in the Brewery Car park, and there is no low cost half an hour rate, which was introduced by CDC two years ago.

I am not necessarily critical of any of these decisions, all made, no doubt, with fiscal prudence in mind – these examples just show that there is a great difference between populist election campaigning and the actuality of balancing budgets as councils help to reduce the country’s economic deficit.

BARRY GIBBS

Tetbury