• Could someone please explain to me the rationality behind the decision to return £1.6 million to council tax payers at a cost of £1.2 million. Having already expended, what would seem to be, an inordinate amount of council tax collecting the said sum of £1.6 million it would seem to be madness to spend yet more of our money returning this sum to individual council tax payers. What a waste of time and resources, to what end ? Who would benefit? certainly not the council tax payers.
• Having established that Surrey is one of the safest areas in the UK we must assume this has been achieved by prudent use of the police budget over many years and the establishment of effective policing within the county, in spite of the continual overwhelming imposition of "red tape" and time consuming "form-filling" by the mandarins of Whitehall. Attempting to cut the current budget, which will inevitably result in the reduction of the level of policing we have come to expect and are prepared to pay for, would seem to be a retrograde step for no apparent reason.
• The effect on the overall morale of the Surrey Police Force and the loss of so many front line "Coppers" and support staff will surely affect the standard of policing which we demand and are prepared to pay for. There will, inevitably, be a reduction in the number of police we see on the "beat" and we have all borne witness to what that means and how communities have been blighted by the lack of policing. There is, to the best of my knowledge, no demand for a reduction in the numbers of policemen in our county, there has not been a public outcry or widespread criticism of the proposed police budget, so what is the reasoning behind this?
• Having only recently achieved the level of neighbourhood policing that the majority of residents have been craving for many years, to now jeopardise that goodwill and co-operation that is so necessary to good local policing would in itself be a "crime" against our community.
• Our recently elected county councillors, who provide the police authority for our county should be seen, en bloc, to support our Chief Constable and our policemen in their endeavours to rescind this strange and inexplicable demand, as should our Member of Parliament. We should avail ourselves of every opportunity to raise the matter with our elected representatives and insist they try to get this decision overturned.
• We should also consider the effect this decision, should it be enforced, could have on local democracy. We elect representatives to oversee the day-to-day administration of our county, including the police authority. To have some faceless mandarin in Whitehall overrule our elected representatives and impose a financial penalty on the council tax payers of Surrey for no reason other than to make a point would seem to be very authoritarian.
Michael P Probert, Lower Weybourne Lane, Farnham