SIR – I attended the public meeting convened to fight the closure of Watchet's Library last week. It was good to see so many residents as well as supporters from other parts of the county in attendance.
Thanks must go to the organisers for arranging an opportunity for the townsfolk to make their strong feelings known.
I must also say that it was brave of the representatives from Somerset County Council to attend, well knowing that there would be a great deal of animosity and anger at their decision to close our library.
They have an extremely difficult task and it doesn't help to belittle that fact.
We all, apart from one member of the audience who would appear to be from another planet, realise that cuts in public services are inevitable during the present national financial meltdown, but to close one of the very few facilities we have in Watchet is frankly a cut too far.
I believe that at the same time as condemning the closure, we should make suggestions to our hard-working representatives as to where other economies can be made - that way, there will be funding left over for such an important facility as Watchet Library.
It's very easy for us to criticise the council's decisions but let us help them by suggesting what the community can dispense with instead.
I'm no expert but I would have thought that those very grand offices the West Somerset Council recently built in Williton may have excessive space for its purposes and that could be rented out to a private tenant, the income being more than enough to fund our library.
Well that's my suggestion - do others have more ideas to throw in the melting pot?
Edward Frewin,
Goviers Lane,
Watchet.