R EDITOR - Your letters page and comments I have received from Society members persuaded me to see for myself the state of the gravestones in Bromsgrove Cemetery.

I was amazed to see so much damage, caused by those charged with caring for it.

I noted, alongside most of the stones laid flat, an official notice that "following a safety inspection this memorial stone was found to be unsafe and therefore laid down".

The notice then invited grave owners to contact a suitably qualified memorial mason to "refit" the stones.

No doubt like many of your readers, I recollect the anger in the town a few years ago caused by the wanton vandalism to gravestones by youths.

I consider the recent action by our council ranks as municipal vandalism - at our expense.

Action

The council's action was taken, I believe, following the death of a child in Hartlepool who was killed by a falling gravestone as a result of playing around in the graveyard.

Why the child was allowed to play there I know not.

What were its parents doing?

I note from your earlier edition that the council leader has called for a report from his officers, now due fairly soon.

May I suggest that the report should cover the following:

Did the council obtain a copy of the Coroner's report on the death?

Did that report cover the degree of care for the dead child taken by its parents?

What research was carried out to assess the probability of a similar occurrence in Bromsgrove? And what conclusions were drawn?

What criteria were used by the council's officers to determine what constituted an "unsafe" headstone?

Who authorised the "safety inspection"?

Were members consulted beforehand?

To cause so much damage is bad enough. To have the gall to leave the grave owners the task and the cost of re-erecting the headstones and crosses beggars belief.

Mrs Jennie McGregor-Smith wrote (February 19) that families of some of the dead are no longer alive.

Are their headstones condemned to lie flat forever as an example of Bromsgrove Council's respect for the dead, both the famous and the lowly?

The cost of reinstatement should be borne by Bromsgrove Council, for which of course, we the taxpayers will have to pay, one way or another.

This matter will be discussed by the Society's executive committee later this month.

Graham Reddie, President of The Bromsgrove Society, East Road, Bromsgrove