SIR – I received a modest 85 votes in the contest for St Clement ward in the city council elections last week and would like to thank those who supported me.

Contrary to all received wisdom, I chose to fight a campaign on local issues and ideas for improving our city, avoiding the usual spin and sloganising.

Of course, as an independent, I had no national party political axe to grind.

I did not call down “a plague on all your houses”

(or rather, parties) but did afford the voters an opportunity to do so if they wished.

I intend to press on with my ideas for a town square between Lowesmoor/St Martin’s and the Trinity, and for a Severn Centre riverside environmental and educational development, and will now seek wider support.

In passing, I was pleased to see Neil Laurenson win St Stephen ward, a ward which I have contested myself unsuccessfully in the past on three occasions.

He was absolutely correct in wanting all the parties to share power (Worcester News, May 9).

Worcester City Council was hung twice in the 1970s and committee chairmanships (equivalent to cabinet memberships today) were shared between Labour and the Tories until 1981 when Labour won an overall majority.

PETER NIELSEN
Worcester