YET more repairs to the road surface in Frideswide Square, this time to the bus laybys.

It wasn’t all that long ago that these laybys were re-done because they weren’t wide enough for the buses. So who pays for this work, the local taxpayer again or is the contractor responsible for inadequate, shoddy work under a maintenance period?

This work and other such botchups which occur after millions of pounds have been spent on different schemes over the last few years will mean that there will never be enough money in the budget to allow proper repairs to localised roads, such as on the estates where the taxpayers live.

This year we had a four per cent increase in our council tax, supposedly to pay for elderly care and suchlike. Has the county council used this extra money to pay for this or has it spent that money on other costs such as these bodged jobs, and will the beggars screw the council taxpayers out of another four per cent or more next year?

I realise that the council gets less from central government and that’s why there is not enough money to pay for everything, but take heart everyone, the Prime Minister Theresa May insists that 0.7 per cent of this country’s gross national income continues to be spent on Overseas Aid on the taxpayers’ behalf, despite five Government departments struggling to spend the amounts allocated to them. Many MPs and Ministers insist, but to no avail, that more of this money should be spent at home to benefit the population of this country. £12.1bn in 2015 and last year just over £13bn given to the overseas budget.

It’s a mystery to me that with all the cutbacks inflicted on local governments, that the national debt which the Tories say they inherited from the last Labour administration has increased by almost 50 per cent in the seven years of Tory rule and not decreased but then with Trident and HS2 to pay for, it’s no surprise really.

MIKE CLARKE Old Marston