HAVING read what Rob Tyler and Cllr Noel Spencer have had to say in the readers' views pages, it seems to me that Bolton Council haven't got any housekeeping skills.

Gutterings don't get cleaned -- they look like window boxes with the amount that grows out of them -- which causes damage to property and costs money to put right. Some tenants get away with misusing property, and then money is spent on repairs and cleansing.

Pavements are sunken and broken, and people fall, resulting in liability costs. Contractors are hired to see to grass areas, their policy to cut and dump, and an abundance of weeds everywhere. Then the litter is like confetti. It's everywhere. Why can't we have our road sweepers back, who had their own areas and kept the pavements swept and free from litter?

Bolton wants to become a city -- what a joke! All I can see is that we're going to get ghettos. I was brought up to believe that you might be poor, but you can still be clean.

Mrs T Butterworth

Cherry Tree Avenue

Farnworth