I HAVE noticed the odd person writing in favour of the 'Big Society', generally nameless and without much evidence to support the concept.

The Big Society is marketed as a socialist utopian vision of handing over state run departments to the public. This appears to be based on the unproven fact, that all government departments are rubbish and that private industry is efficient. Past evidence shows that private industry running public sector normally gives a worse service, costs more and the employees are paid less (hospital cleaning, the railways etc). It's obvious why – the shareholders have to be paid.

The other reason for this right wing Conservative government to do this is because any reduction in government spending can be reflected in huge tax reductions for businesses and the rich. The proof here is that huge tax reductions for businesses in the last budget will be funded by a VAT increase and loss of services. This affects the low paid more that those with lots of money – effectively we pay the tax for the rich.

Now let's look at the charitable side. I am a director of a charity and I can tell you how difficult it is to get funds and people willing to give time freely. If these departments are handed over in this way, they will surely fizzle out, either due to lack of funds, or lack of people (mugs) willing to do the work of people who were paid to do it in the first place. There is also this vision of society controlling the charity, but is that not what happens already as we have a pretty good political system for doing this anyway. If, for instance, the Forest was handed over to the 15,000 people living here, how are they all to have a say in how it is managed – it would be a logistical nightmare and when it runs out of funds, it would be sold off cheaply to a nameless business.

To sum up, you will have much reduced services for the same or more taxation and you will be expected to work for free to assist these depleted services. At the end of the day you will loose these services for good and they will never return.

So – don't just fight against selling off the Forest of Dean, fight against the loss of all services that will go over the next four years.

– Bob Freshwater, Yorkley.