Testing the public in the BCP area for Covid is very important both for the individual and the community.

It is essential to know the symptomatic and asymptomatic incidence of Covid in our community.

However, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and here’s the weakest link.

It appears some Covid testing centres in the BCP area are not performing their service. I was told by chance that a Covid testing centre was open at Boscombe Pier.

I visited the pier and asked people where it was - nobody knew. There were no signs of any testing centre at the pier.

Other people who came to the pier seeking to be tested left without locating the test site. It transpired the testing van had been placed hundreds of yards to the west along a locked barrier section of the promenade.

I found the van, which had six chatting people in fluorescent jackets beside it, but no members of the public were being tested.

A small sign saying covid test centre had been placed directly beside the van was hard to spot. They looked like workmen in fluorescent jackets with a white van from the distance of the pier frontage.

Nobody in the vicinity of the pier seemed aware there was a Covid testing centre.ply.

Other members of the public have told me they have also similarly failed to locate Covid centres or found them completely empty - not testing people.

There appears to be a common theme here of some centres not wishing to actively test people. Yet this is the specific purpose of these centres… to test people ….and not to avoid testing people!

At the Castlepoint Shopping Centre, the Covid testing centre was hidden underground at the back of the car park.

People visiting Castlepoint could not easily find where the Covid testing centre was.

It should have been above ground with banners visible from any part of Castle Point and not unnoticed below ground.

I visited a large Covid testing centre in Boscombe set up in the Hawkwood Road car park.

There were three large white tents and 10 to 15 staff in fluorescent jackets with NHS written on them. They were standing about with nothing to do.

There were absolutely no members of the public being tested – it was completely empty.

I asked them if they were open and was told "yes."

"Could I have a Covid test please,"I asked? I was told, "you cannot be tested unless you have an appointment."

Well, I had no appointment, and nobody told me how to get an appointment.

So, here we have a situation of an empty Covid testing station of 10 -15 staff, declining and not assisting the one member of the public who attended seeking a test. Sheer madness?

None of these testing stations could be found on the Internet when I searched for them.

All of them should have been clearly marked on the Internet and "in your face" clear for the public in the vicinity.

It’s my opinion the contractor staff and the commercial company behind the staff will be paid even if few or no public are tested.

They actually should be on a commission-based test system; then, they would feel obliged to provide an active service.

Any one of these centres will be costing the taxpayer or residents many thousands of pounds a day for an inadequate service not fit for purpose.

Robert Wilson

Bournemouth