YOUR item 'Councils are set to be rolled in to one' (July 8) demonstrates the incredible level of desperation that has descended over Poole and Bournemouth's Tory-run councils.

Back in January, Poole's ruling Tory group out-voted the combined opposition that as-one opposed Poole being part of a new Super Council. Now this radical and contentious Super Council plan is in doubt and an even more rushed Plan B has been cooked up.

The new plan is again one that has been untested elsewhere. It is again presented as a plan the council 'must proceed with'. No alternatives are on offer.

Like the Super Councils, there is no detailed financial analysis worth speaking of and the MTFP numbers being presented are strangely different to those previously published. The plan is not small. It will be enacted across all service functions rather than 'where it makes sense to' which was the approach previously agreed.

And the new Plan B will address budgets in the next financial year, a year earlier than the Super Council plan, this despite Plan B arriving on the agenda for discussion two years later.

It is shocking to watch political dogma dominating a council's decision-making in such a way. And now it has perhaps become too late to even ask 'Who let the dogma out'?

DR MARTIN RODGER Bloxworth Road, Poole