As reported on the front page of the Tenbury Advertiser of November 6, the Standards Board for England has decided not to investigate my complaint against certain councillors.

This news will come as no small comfort to the councillors named and I suppose one ought not to begrudge the blunderers a little rejoicing. They need it. With this fear removed might we see a softening in their attitude towards the Tennis Club? If so, the exercise will have been worthwhile.

But if the Mayor has been quoted correctly when she says, 'The whole council has been found to have acted correctly and we have been exonerated', there is a danger that, certainly the council but more worryingly, the public might be misled by what looks to be an exaggerated claim. It's not possible to say whether this is a deliberate distortion or a lapse in comprehension. Certainly the terms 'acted correctly' and 'exonerated' do not appear as a description of the council in the literature I have received from the Standards Board. It is difficult to see how the Board could say this without an investigation.

It needs to be understood that the Standards Board has quite a narrow remit and is basically concerned only with breaches of the code of conduct and not more general matters like maladministration. Sadly no independent body exists at present to perform this function on behalf of the electorate at town and parish council level. This is a weakness that needs to be addressed if there is to be proper and effective local accountability. Without such checks the council can blunder on. The only remedy is through the ballot box - if sufficient public interest can be mustered.

In notifying me of its decision, the Board said that it had decided that this allegation should not be investigated because it related to 'a position taken by the council as a whole'.

The complaint appears to have failed purely because it named those councillors thought to be most culpable for the blunders made. The implication is that had the whole council been named there might well have been an investigation. But this might have been unfair to those members of the council eg the new ones, who are perhaps only guilty of being misled. Yet again the council has been saved by the innocents in its ranks.

The council badly needs some 'good press' but it needs to ensure it is based on the facts properly presented.

R J Thomas,

Boraston,

Tenbury Wells.