My husband and I would like to make the following comments.

IT seems quite clear reading the letter from the chairman of Macclesfield's planning committee that Martin Bell has ruffled Joan Barnes' feathers (Knutsford Guardian February 10)

The problem the council seem to have with our MP is that he's an independent - not a member of any secret society and not one who asks for free lunches. Maybe at last the people of this borough are saying enough is enough after too many inconsistencies made by the borough planning department.

The Prime Minister got it right in an article in the Mail on Sunday (February 6) when he said he wanted to 'kill the committee culture where councillors spend hours in endless meetings while real decisions are made behind closed doors.' In the Knutsford Guardian (February 3) Martin Bell asked just who ran Macclesfield Borough Council? The elected representatives with the support and advice of their officers or the officers whom no one elected to anything.

In the same article he said a well-respected Tory councillor had described the planning department as a 'rich man's law.'

Yes, Mrs Barnes, there is a dark cloud over your department.

You state in your letter that a Crown Court judge described us as carrying out a vendetta against Macclesfield Borough Council planning authority.

That would be Judge Geoffrey Kilfoil, whose judgement was recently called into question in a November 1 article in The Sunday Times, where, in a peer review, he scored 2 out of 10 for fairness and 3 out of 10 for sound judgement.

Not very impressive.

We are confident when we eventually put our case in front of the independent judges of the European Commission of Human Rights in Strasbourg, Judge Kilfoil's verdict will be overturned.

We also believe that we will be awarded hundreds of thousands of pounds compensation and costs.

The downside is that it will be paid out of taxpayers' pockets.

To close our reply to your published letter we conclude with two points Mrs Barnes - the first being all my husband and I want to do is to expand our business and to get on with our lives.

That will mean us getting justice and equality from Macclesfield Borough Council.

This is something we have not had for many years.

You try to brand us as rebels and anarchists yet we have total support from our independent Mr Martin Bell and our Euro MP Brian Simpson and also a large majority of the people in this borough.

They cannot all be wrong.

And our last point Mrs Barnes is this - we cannot believe you are still the chairman of Macclesfield Borough Council Planning Department and we again draw your attention to an article that appeared in The Times on Saturday, July 5 1997, when it questioned your judgement regarding the Neil Hamilton affair, your husband has already fulfilled his promise to resign his posts if Sir Gordon Downey found against Mr Hamilton ?, The Times suggested you do the same.

So why did you not do the honourable thing?

You can no longer hide behind your closed doors.

It is time for you and the rest of your cronies to pack your bags and allow the people of this borough a fresh start.

MR AND MRS M WHEETMAN

Knutsford Road

Alderley Edge

Converted for the new archive on 13 March 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.