To:The Editor

West Sussex Gazette

Oh No! Not Connections Again

Dear Sir,

           It's that time of the year again. The West Sussex County Council's "Connections" "newspaper" has just flopped through my letter box.

           This grotesque waste of council tax payers money is just a propaganda sheet, telling us, at our own expense, just how wonderful the council is. Nothing about whether the council is trying to cut back on rubbish collections like many others across the country, or if our carefully selected recycling is actually thrown together with the rest of the rubbish and put on a slow boat to China. 

           The lead story this time is "Exam Results Moving On Up" telling us how "results are on the up" whatever that means, followed by "GCSE results could be up by as much as four per cent his year, increasing for the second year in a row". Does this mean the number of exams taken has gone up, or the quality of the results? It's not clear. What is clear is that our education system has been dumbed down to the point where grades have become meaningless. Where's the story on that?

           What is also obvious is that this newspaper is not written by proper journalists or organised by editors (declaration of interest, I'm a journalist but not involved with local newspapers). It is taking sales away from legitimate local newspapers and siphoning off advertising revenue.

           The council should be raising its profile with the local media, who could write about the council with some independence and  balance, not trying to grandstand its performance in this way. I'm no lawyer, but surely it can't be legal for a council to use money belonging to its tax payers to publish this self serving rubbish?

            Yours sincerely

             Neil Winton

Oct 11, 2006