I READ with interest the article on Monday, October 4, about the proposed Council Tax rise.

I just wonder what true value we will get for paying more money to the council -- to a council that is willing to spend ratepayers' money on beautifying council property, instead of improving services.

I speak of this because I walk past the council flats on Crompton Street, in Farnworth, and, while I agree they might have needed a new roof on the flats, and the front of the building had some of the rendering replaced -- do the flats really need the expense of the four access paths, each approx six metres long by just over a metre wide, changing from flagstones to expensive block paving in a herringbone pattern?

Do they need an ornamental, wrought iron fence, which a grown man can stride over, placing around the front facade of the flats; and do they need a car park building at the rear, which will probably end up as another place for the idiots to dump stolen cars and to burn them out?

There must be a heck of a lot of other ways this council is wasting our money, instead of using it to improve the lives and the locations of us private house owners, as well as the council property owners.

John O'Connor

Worsley Road, Bolton