SIR, — I often wonder if our St Albans district councillors read their agendas when attending the various committees on which they serve. The latest prompt for this comment is the recently-received recycling news in which we are told that from now on we

SIR, - I often wonder if our St Albans district councillors read their agendas when attending the various committees on which they serve. The latest prompt for this comment is the recently-received "recycling news" in which we are told that from now on we are to be deprived of a separate bag for cardboard as the council have discovered that cardboard is compostible and so can now be put into our wheelie bins along with our other garden waste.

I wish they had told us where we are to put the garden waste now to be displaced by the cardboard. I think the traditional bag had a capacity of about two-thirds of a cubic metre but since it was open-ended, a good deal more than this could be packed in. And so we are now left with reduced capacity, an easier collecting job for the contractors, a saving in costs to the council and a further diminution in service to council tax payers.

Which is why I ask, do our councillors read their agendas? If so how did they approve this change? Or was the subject not put before the council at all but pushed through merely on the whim of an unelected officer? I hope not the latter which really would reflect a serious dereliction of duty on the part of our councillors.

They really should remember that they are where they are to represent the best interests of all citizens and if they are not sure what those interests are they can learn a great deal from the columns of the local newspaper. If they are too lazy to read that as well as their agendas then they should step aside and make way for others with a greater sense of service.

PHILIP WEBSTER,

Townsend Drive, St Albans,