WILTSHIRE Council is carrying out a consultation on proposed cuts to bus services, but what about the alternative approach (option 24/7) that everyone is talking about?

I’m not an expert by any means but perhaps improving bus services and attracting more passengers rather than cutting services to the bone might just be worth exploring!

I’ve just been on to the option247.uk website and although I don’t yet understand all the detail, a positive approach supported by the people responsible for the fantastic improvements in our train services is good enough for me to support and the website explains how to do this.

Why does something like this have to come from outside Wiltshire Council, instead of from within. I understand that the law has just been changed to allow more innovative approaches to bus operation, so why isn’t Wiltshire Council taking advantage of this by welcoming and exploring alternatives to cuts? Perhaps more welcoming bus shelters with maps showing routes instead of just lists of stop names and times should be considered too.

On another and equally important subject, I suggest we all watch the way the Melksham Campus plans are going very carefully, especially what’s now being included and what isn’t. It’s great to see anything that benefits the community being planned, but when things that we were told were being funded separately are now being included as part of the campus and coming out of the ‘unchanged budget commitment of Wiltshire Council to the campus’, doesn’t that effectively mean cuts to the project? And what’s with the name change to ‘health and wellbeing centre’?

A community consultation took place over a year ago and the name and even the colours of the sign were agreed. How has this change come about? If you Google ‘health and wellbeing centres’ you will find a mixture of approaches and facilities quite different from what was originally envisaged for Melksham.

Of course health and wellbeing should be an important aspect of any campus but who decided that’s what it should now be called? Community consultations were carried out over a three-year period to determine what the community wanted to see in the campus.

These consultations were carried out by the shadow Community Operations Board (COB) set up by the Melksham Area Board and chaired by an area board member. Are the results of these being taken into account?We’re being told we should be looking forward and making sure Melksham benefits to the full from the significant investment involved and I share that view wholeheartedly. But I also worry about the risks of not also looking back and learning from mistakes and the effects of unfulfilled commitments.

Colin Goodhind, Longford Road, Melksham