Town forum a misnomer?

Published on 25/10/2012 12:36

I SEE that our council leader Peter Box has made reference in his letter (Express October 18) to the Pontefract Business Forum.

He also adds that the meetings of the forum will not be held in public.

Maybe the people who set up and named the forum are unfamiliar with the word. The word forum originally applied to an open area or public meeting place in Rome and consequently any forum, even today, by definition constitutes an open meeting.

I would suggest that the business forum change its name in an event that it might be labelled a misnomer. Or on the other hand perhaps it could open its meetings to the public.

One other slight error I noticed was that it was stated that there was evidence that local people do not want another tier of governance.

I seem to remember that as a result of the community governance review in March 2010 there was a majority vote in favour of a town council for Pontefract. Thus contradicting the above assumption in Coun Box’s letter.

This information was widely known. I am surprised that Coun Box was not aware of it.

There was a second governance review, I don’t know why. Where the votes cast were apparently not checked against the voters’ register, thus it would seem that vote becomes invalid.

I am all in favour of any forum, group, society etc that will improve Pontefract. But the only way forward is for the representatives of these groups to work with Wakefield Council and also openly with the people of Pontefract for the betterment of our town.

M SKIDMORE

Stonegate Drive

Pontefract

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