WITH regard to charging to park in the 'Forest towns'. This is nothing more than a back door way of raising taxes. Being charged for services and facilities which were previously provided 'free' to the public by the district council (or any other arm of the government) is a stealth tax. 

I live in Cinderford and, like many of the Forest towns, the shops in the town centre have faced very hard trading conditions exacerbated by the current economic downturn. Any reduction in footfall to the town centre would be disastrous for many of these traders. Car parking charges are in effect a 'shopper tax' to be levied on anyone who shops in the town, penalising people who support local businesses. 

In Cinderford there has been an ongoing effort to regenerate the town and a huge amount of time and money has been invested to achieve this end. In my opinion if the district council wanted to thwart these efforts to revitalise our town centres imposing this tax would be the most effective way of doing it!

I have long thought that the free parking in the Forest towns was an asset that should have been used as part of a strategy to draw the many visitors to the Forest of Dean into our town centres and boost trade. Unfortunately joined-up thinking appears to be absent from the supporters of this proposal.

I think the control of parking in many ways should be the responsibility of the town councils as they are best placed to judge the needs of their communities. Perhaps the district council could bequeath the car parks to the towns together with the monies set aside in the budget for their maintenance.

– Councillor Hedley Sutton, Cinderford Town Council.