I REFER to your article on Licensing (26/5) and the comments by James Arkell and Lionel Starling.

I whole heartedly agree with everything they say.

No one could be working harder than Arkells, especially Margaret Leech, to make some sense of this shambles.

I also have to say that Swindon Council's policy is one of the more workable ones, and yet still there are serious issues to address.

Lionel Starling and his team have worked tirelessly to try to lobby the DCMS (Department of Culture Media and Sport) to change forms and relax what was supposed to be an easier process from the old magistrates system, which was once every three years at a cost of £30, on a single A4 application.

The new system involves upwards of 300 pieces of paper.

Costs vary but average out at £300 per application plus a yearly inspection, which for most will be nearly £200.

I have personally written to Mr Purnell the new minister responsible and, three weeks on, have not even received an acknowledgement.

However in an interview with Publican Newspaper he makes it clear from the answers he gives on licensing that he has no concept of what is going on.

He believes (one assumes because his officials have told him so), that all in the garden is rosy.

But as James Arkell says, it is chaos. A fact no licensing officer would privately disagree with.

What is needed now is for both Swindon's MPs and for that matter all of Wiltshire's and national ones too to tell HMG/DCMS that the industry is in serious trouble over this.

Unless action is taken local authorities and the police will be put in the position of having to sanction law-breaking just to force through a policy which no front line licensee even wanted.

So I call on Anne Snelgrove and Michael Wills to take up this issue.

What we all need is a radical re-think on the application procedure and a delay to implementation.

That is the only way this can be satisfactorily be concluded, and there is no point in Mr Purnell taking comfort from the fact that a few have applied.

Many applications have failed and 95 per cent of us haven't even yet submitted one.

Perhaps the Evening Advertiser could interview our two MPs and establish whether they will indeed raise this issue.

R FEAL-MARTINEZ

South Marston