Why is Councillor York so touchy (Letters October 1) ? There was no suggestion of any impropriety whatsoever.

Nobody who was involved in the furore over the land north of Barnet Lane could claim not to have known that I was on the WHOSE! committee. After all, at the public meetings I spoke on behalf of that committee, and more than 20 of my letters on the subject appeared in the Borehamwood Times.

Nor should anybody be surprised that when members of that committee met with councillors, planners or anybody involved with the project, they reported back to the committee.

At one such meeting it was stated that the owners of that land had approached the council. There was nothing sinister about that. Apparently there are approaches from developers of various properties all through the year. It did not mean that Councillor York and the owners had met face to face. It only meant that some officers and, possibly councillors, had met with representatives of the owners.

The councillor is fully aware that it is impossible for anybody to demonstrate that he "unknowingly spoke to the owner". Nor would it matter if he had. Again, nobody has suggested that he had acted improperly.

I also find it difficult to understand that the councillor should not know the identity of the owner. The then District Plan did create a deep division between the council and the voters. The name of the owner was known to so many officers and councillors that, as our county representative for the ward, it would have been difficult not to know.

Councillor Ward claims (Letters October 1) that I had "displayed a similar brand of confused thinking... on the merits of a traffic scheme for Manor Way".

Well, the confusion is on the part of the councillor. I have never been involved in any exchange of views with him, or anyone else, on any scheme for Manor Way.

As far as I am aware there is nobody else of the same name in Borehamwood. So is it acceptable for him to confuse me with someone else, but it is not acceptable for Mr Sheppard to confuse one Mrs Ward with another?

Would I be forgiven for quoting from the councillor's letter that "this is another prime example of confused thinking".

M Hiller

Carrington Avenue

Borehamwood

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000.Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.