FURTHER to the articles in the paper about how the council should spend any receipt from Alexandra Park Lodge, I would like to make the following points.

The Borough of Poole faces a rapidly increasing, well above national average, ageing population and more than 40 per cent of the council annual budget is spent on social care.

A rapidly increasing birth rate and increasing numbers of children and young people entering the care system take up further huge sums of the annual budget.

Government funding has been significantly cut in recent years and the council struggles to make ends meet. We have a projected deficit in our schools Capital pot in this financial year of just under £3m.

In planning for this financial year we had to make provision for savings and growth in children and adult social care of over £7m – therefore it would be impractical to hypothecate capital receipts to specific projects.

I would however like to point out that over the past 10 years almost £300,000 has been spent on Alexandra Park providing improved lighting, youth shelters, play areas, new entrances and improved play facilities for 8-13 year age range.

None of this paid by local council tax payers but gained through government Playbuilder grant and contributions from developers in the Penn Hill area.

The council must always be vigilant in identifying areas that it can draw funding to meet key priorities, such as developer contributions and specialised one off government grants rather than relying on government funding, or the council tax payer (30/70) or from the sale of assets to make our town the beautiful place that it is.

ELAINE ATKINSON Leader of the Council, Borough of Poole