With great personal respect to Shane Burns, General Manager of ADC, I acknowledge and appreciate the time he spent explaining to me the process of reclaiming ratepayers’ money invested with Lehman Brothers (Letters, April 11). However, Mr Burns says part of that process includes a “writing down” of the debt which may be “returned in subsequent years’: Mr Burns does not say how much of that debt may be returned – but says (not very reassuringly), “the actual cash for many of council’s investments still lies in trust accounts in England’ (Letters, April 11). Why in England? Why not Australia? How much will it cost ratepayers to get this money released from the overseas trust accounts? Given this context, surely it is financially irresponsible for ADC to give our money away to the organisers of bread-and-circuses events like the recent “Day on the Green” (Letters, March 19).
Now, to Mr Tom Livanos who writes that he “cannot accept (my) non-stop negativity’ (Letters, April 11): dear me, how sad, never mind. Cheer up, Mr Livanos, things are bound to become worse – positively.
Dr Paul Fidlon,
Armidale
