...The “arts and theatre”

are some people’s meat and other people’s poison. It is a matter of taste and priority.

What infuriates many Colcestrians is the manner of the Vaf ’s introduction.

Lack of proper public consultation, the secrecy that surrounds the contract clauses, the style of the building completely out of kilter with many people’s taste.

Last, but not least, the site at Colchester’s bus station, which served so many people so well.

Therefore, by all these criteria, the ordinary, sensible Colchester public consider the cost and debt that the Vaf arts and theatre group have been given is an unnecessary and costly extravagance hanging over the heads of council taxpayers.

Compare the enthusiasm Colchester citizens have shown for the Roman circus, which demonstrates exactly where public opinion lies.

Had Colchester citizens shown support for the Vaf in the same manner they have supported the Roman circus, then yes they would “love” the Vaf.

But Colcestrians don’t, and the more the Vaf is thrust down their throats, the more they will resent it!

Allan Hewitt
Bluebell Way
Colchester

...Mission Impossible is my response to the article headed “How do we make you love Vaf ?”

The arrogance and contempt which the Vaf promoters had towards the people of Colchester when they dumped this costly folly on Colchester, destroying the town’s bus station in the process, when surveys showed that some 90 per cent disagreed with what was going on, is bad enough.

But, now, for one of the leading figures behind the Vaf – the chief of Arts Council East – to plead for local residents to support the white elephant, adds insult to injury.

Before work started, I warned that the Vaf was not financially sustainable.

But, even I never thought the cost would soar from £16million to £25million, and work would overrun by two years. Andrea Stark, Arts Council East’s executive director, cannot claim she was not aware.

As the Gazette rightly reported, she “has worked on the project from the start”.

Indeed, she has.

She has been involved at every stage, but she is not the only person who needs to be held to account for what has happened.

When will there be a public inquiry? When will the Audit Commission investigate?

Had Ms Stark listened to what I advised her, when she had a meeting with me at my constituency office, then (a) Colchester would have had a visual arts facility for the past two years; (b) it would not have cost more than £16million (probably less); (c) it would have been of a scale and design in keeping with the town’s architecture; and (d) we would still have a bus station, indeed a modern bus station, on the same site.

At a separate meeting, I gave the same advice to a senior Conservative councillor who has been heavily involved in the whole Vaf project. He, also, chose to ignore what I suggested and backed the Vaf as we now have it.

Quite simply, this is what should have happened: Demolition of the ugly Sixties office blocks and ground-floor shops fronting Queen Street; erection of a new building along the frontage in keeping with the townscape of Britain’s oldest recorded town; and modernisation of the bus station as an integral part of the development to become Britain’s first “bus station art gallery”.

Now, that would have provided both a tourist attraction as well as a public transport facility for residents and visitors alike!

Ms Stark is quoted in the Gazette as saying the Vaf is “a drop-dead gorgeous building”. What on Earth is meant by such nonsense?

It is not the words used by most people to describe this appaling edifice.

One has only to contrast the public support for the Roman circus to see how much out of step those behind the Vaf have been throughout.

If only Ms Stark and Co had worked with the people of Colchester, then she and the Vaf would not be in this costly mess – and it is local residents who are the losers in every sense.

Bob Russell
MP for Colchester
Magdalen Hall
Wimpole Road

Colchester

...One way to get Colcestrians to change their attitude to their new arts building could be to make the temporary bus station permanent.

Unless I am very much mistaken, it has been the threat of losing this major facility for the people of Colchester which has turned so many against the Vaf project.

B J Butler
Guildford Road
Colchester