OH, dear, I do seem to have got somewhat up the nostrils of the motoring lobby, don't I?

I might strut the odd corridor of power, but, as it happens, my theme-song this month isn't "bring back the hand-loom weavers" -- more like "Rescue the Kyoto Agreement and save our descendants from global warming." At least two of your contributors have accused me of Luddism -- not that Ned Ludd and his collaborators in the Leicestershire village of Anstey were unmitigated villains. They were being thrown on the industrial scrapheap, without so much as a groat of severance pay, and no welfare benefit system to cushion the blow. And then, as now, the mill-owners trousered the profits. Perhaps they had a genuine grievance.

But it is the picture of modernity cherished by the motoring lobby that reduces me to tears (or occasionally laughter.) "Unless commerce is allowed to flow freely," they solemnly opine, "it will go away!" Where to, my old lovelies? Every major highway in Greater Manchester is on the verge of gridlock now -- there ain't nowhere for it to go. Besides, bypasses and motorways aren't modern any more. They are 1980s Retro, along with Mrs Thatcher and her Great Car Economy. 'Modern' is park and ride, light rapid transit, and bus priority measures. It's all in the Greater Manchester Local Transport Plan -- read it, and get yourselves an up to date lifestyle instead of expecting Bolton MBC to spend its scarce capital resources building a bypass for people who, for the most part, do not live in Bolton, pay Council Tax in Bolton, or make any perceivable contribution to the local economy, apart from the pollution they leave behind as they pass through. To paraphrase another of your contributors, which bit of 'No!' don't they understand?

Cllr Peter Johnston

Kendal Road, Bolton