WHAT is the point of an elected council if the only people they represent are members of the Government?

I refer to the shocking way in which Herefordshire Council recently accepted T-Mobile's application for a mobile phone mast in the centre of Colwall in spite of considerable opposition.

In a very small locality well over 200 people opposed the mast by signing a petition or sending letters of protest. Many of these individuals represent larger community groups, including children. This was clearly a most unpopular proposal.

If this had been an ordinary commercial or domestic application, it would have been refused. But because the Government is determined to increase mobile phone coverage in the country the council had a vested interest in pushing this application through as quickly as possible with little reference to the public opinion, need or safety.

There is an economically driven Government directive that mobile phone mast applications are not to be refused on health grounds, yet there is sufficient evidence linking mobile phone masts to cancers and other serious illnesses to suggest that a fully comprehensive and lengthy research programme should be undertaken to ascertain whether or not masts pose a threat to health. Until such a time that reassurances based on sound evidence can be made, no government or council is justified in approving further mast development.

I own a mobile phone but place far greater value on my family's health than I do on my mobile phone reception. I imagine that the parents of children in three schools nearby feel the same. What kind of world do we live in that groups of people conspire and succeed in putting commercial interests above the lives of the next generation?

DR N HAMILTON, Colwall.