People worried about cuts and privatisation

Most people were justifiably dismayed at the hash G4S made at the Olympic Games, resulting in serving police officers from all over the country having leave and family holidays cancelled, as well as armed forces personnel having to be drafted in, to ensure security after G4S failed to deliver.

He must know that police authorities are facing 25 - 30 per cent reductions in their policing budgets and that was a political decision made by the coalition government.

The creeping privatisation of other public services like health and education and the selling off of publicly owned assets like school playing fields,is not new either.

It follows on from the pattern set in the 70s and 80s when previous Conservative governments made the clear political choices that public utilities like water, gas and electricity along with coal, the railways and many other publicly owned assets,should be sold to the private sector.

The free market philosophy of Milton Friedman and others, behind these sell-offs, is as dogmatic as you can get. Shareholders at home and abroad now have to get their profit but it is the British public as consumers who have to live with the consequences of higher prices and eroded services.

Mr Pithie should listen to the real concerns of people in Warwickshire who know and value the quality service they get from the police and have a right to worry about the consequences of cuts and privatisation. - Moir Ferguson, Warwick New Road, Leamington.