B C Vaughan, of Higher Street, Dartmouth, writes:

Who gave the South Hams Council executive the conclusive concept that Dartmouth, particularly, is a bottomless pit to trawl for even more cash in support of and in continuance of their persistent empire building?

This is in spite of the known EEC-recognised impoverishment of this strictly rural area, where static growth, development and pragmatic ability to meet a burden of extra taxation contributions is obviously just not there.

What warped thinking issuing from this local government office arrogantly overrules central Government's policy direction and provision of special financial allocations, nationwide – targeted especially – to prevent a further erosive inflationary increase of this wretched open ended injudicious taxing of dwellings, entitled vaguely as council tax. (An obnoxious hybrid from poll tax).

An in-depth assessment of the terminus town of Dartmouth particularly indicates that really huge amounts of cash are being systematically removed by several types of exploiter – not indigenous within the Dartmouth area – with no regard as to the litany of factors revealing severe impoverishment, chronic decay and a languishing of Dartmouth as a viable, vibrant, self-supporting town with economic strengths, capable of generating and withholding its own capital to invest in the future.

The townspeople – as a whole – really will have to join together in a determined move to act as a bulwark against this weeping wound of the town's lifeblood.

All towns and villages need to be protected by a designated 'wellbeing indicator' which, when referrred to, would render it unlawful for outsiders to purposely invest their interests in Dartmouth – expressly organised to take away or obviously undermine local business, choice of services and entrepreneurial vision.

This quite unnecessary rise of increase of council tax (Chronicle, February 17, page nine) of 2.5 per cent is imposed along with a rise to 20 per cent of VAT, extraordinary fuel rises from all sources, huge, greed-fuelled rend and business rate rises crippling to occupational therapy or full closure, shops after shop, with food prices needing a ten-pound note to even begin shopping for the breakfast menu.

The common man has no such responsibility for the massive missing millions of pounds, which has brought about 'recession' – it is the height of blind, obsessive pure greed to impose its correction and replacement on ordinary people.

Always people are coming to Dartmouth to take away – always to take away – never to bring business or industry which will add to the town's prosperity – completely unable to establish anything without banging a begging bowl to others or no domicile in Dartmouth, for cash, grants or to be entrapped within a punitive contract, in order to – well, advance just a little – yet Dartmouth is being sucked dry and the town cannot hide it.

Many exciting developments cannot be done – but the town has turned into an historic museum, inhabited by a population battered and dispirited by ill-use, being trampled on by too many who see Dartmouth ripe for asset stripping, or a masonry bank account for their savings.

There's a beautiful safe harbour; a massive power source; mainly empty of commerce, shipping, with nothing worth writing home about built to encourage the tourists, since the building of the now rarely used bandstand.