Unlike Kevin Blake (Dec 30), I haven’t done a survey on the people who want, or don’t want, the Sports Village in Basildon.

For the few number of people he speaks of, there are many more who would have liked to have seen that amount of money spent on the Basildon district, making it safer and tidier.

Pavements with broken slabs. Shopping areas with sunk, broken block paving.

Footpaths and roads full of potholes, some with 3ft high weeds growing out of them.

When it snows, pavements outside primary schools, old people’s homes and shopping areas are too dangerous to walk on.

Years ago, these places would always be cleared.

Not a few shovels of grit, thrown over the ice, if you were lucky. Where’s health and safety?

These are a few items the people of Basildon would have preferred to have seen their council tax spent on.

K Cowell
Crown Close
Basildon