COUNCILLOR Derek Smallwood (letters, November 7) still can't seem to make his mind up whether we have a clean city or not.

Incredibly, he quotes again the already discredited line that a Thomas Cook survey revealed earlier in the year that York was a clean city. No it didn't, the survey asked tourists which was their favourite city to visit.

York came second to London. A small number of these wrote in comments and only a handful mentioned cleanliness. Hardly a scientific assessment.

City of York York Council has now reacted to a Liberal Democrat proposal that we should thoroughly review the way in which we keep clean the public and private areas within the city.

The quickest way of reviewing the problem would have been to get the staff running the cleaning contracts to draw up proposals to get the city "out of the mire".

But Labour and Conservative councillors decided it would be better to spend the winter in 'scrutiny' committee meetings.

Ironically, these will be chaired by the leader of the tiny Conservative group who helped cause the problem in the first place by voting with Labour to cut the cleaning services budget earlier this year.

Any review must look at the consequences of the £1 million that Labour has hacked off the city's environment budget since 1999 and, in particular, the penalty resulting from getting rid of the council's cleaning supervisors in

June.

These were the people on the ground who checked on the state of our streets and open spaces. The effects of the cuts have been so severe that no matter how diligent the remaining council staff they are left with one hand tied behind their back.

Coun Andrew Waller

Liberal Democrat,

Environment,

Carnot Street, York.

Updated: 11:03 Tuesday, November 13, 2001