STEVEN GALTON is selective in his presentation of the facts in relation to the sulphur plant debate at the council’s recent planning panel.

He neglects to mention that I, as a Labour councillor for Freemantle, also urged members of the panel to reject the planning application.

In doing so I was only too aware that panel members would then have to accept the previous (inferior) planning application that was agreed when the Conservatives were running the council.

Panel members who supported the revised application chose the lesser of two evils. This was not a party political decision as Steven Galton dangerously suggests.

One Conservative member of the panel voted against the proposal, another abstained whilst the third mysteriously absented himself when the vote was taken. The local market relations company hired by developers Oxbow was represented by another former Millbrook Conservative councillor.

Conservative protestations now are a little late in the day. It was a catastrophic oversight by the Freemantle ward councillors that got us into this mess in the first place. It’s a shame that local residents are now having to pay the price.

CLLR DAVE SHIELDS, Labour Freemantle ward.