WELL look who's speaking up in the Echo yesterday, Councillor Collier for Poole apologising after all the problems are well over for the failure of bin collections for four weeks over Christmas.

The councillor thanks us for our patience. Well I've got news councillor not patience, outrage for letting us all down so dreadfully.

As for the matter of the ice before Christmas, and the one week shut-down over Christmas, is it beyond the wit of a major council with all your resources to work out, (a) Christmas is the busiest time of the year, and (b) the weather is most likely to be its worst in the middle of winter?

And given those two facts, and putting them together, who on earth sanctioned a one week holiday every year?

And how much more of this nonsense goes on in Poole council?

As for the cost of bringing in extra staff being too high, does the councillor really think this stacks up?

We read in the Echo just last week that £100,000 has been spent on Poole Dolphin pool to, by all accounts, ruin a perfectly good swimming pool.

Loads of money for whatever nutty schemes council thinks worth-while but oh dear me look how poor we are when it comes to finding money to keep a basic bin service running. On this performance heaven help us if we ever get seriously flooded.

CHRISTOPHER ELIKER, Winston Avenue, Poole