FIRST I would like to point out (in response to a letter in the Journal) to Mr Jones that I would love to meet him to show him that I’m not arrogant, just passionate on something I believe in.

The busway meetings started back in 1998-99 and I wasn’t a councillor then.

I was however a resident at the time so attended a meeting, like many others, to listen to the very passionate Mr and Mrs Parkinson from Tyldesley say why it would be great to have the busway.

Our roads are gridlocked with cars and that, as we know, will increase over the next 10 years, so something had to be done.

I think Norman Bradbury is choosing to forget he supported the Cambridge busway.

A few years ago members of Transport for Greater Manchester went to see the Cambridge scheme.

Councillors can back me in saying that Mr Bradbury was so thrilled with the busway he rushed to have his photo taken with the then chair of transport Roger Jones in front of the buses.

I definitely wasn’t dreaming that one.

I have listened to many business owners in our towns as they cringe about reading in the press of some ex-councillors’ negative comments.

I have even heard people say that they don’t shop in our towns because of negativity. That is why only positive remarks about our towns come from me.

While in Atherton on a recent Saturday we saw many people from out of town shopping there. We asked them why they shop in Atherton and they said: “You have great shops, I feel safe, there are lovely benches to sit on and have a rest and there was free parking when I used to come in my car but now there’s great access via public transport.”

In meetings that is what I portray – all the good points of all our local towns.

In my opinion if you’re positive then people will come back, and if our residents have better access to jobs in or around Greater Manchester then they will have money to spend in our shops in our town centres.

I did make one error in my last leaflet and that was the fact that £4 million has been spent on Leigh, Atherton and Tyldesley, not the £1 million I said.

This wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t had the busway investment.

The new busway had more than 28,000 passengers in 28 days. Wow!

Now that shows you how much it’s needed and I urge everyone to try it and use it, as it offers the most comfortable, stress-free travel I’ve had in a long time.

Finally, on the point that wannabe councillor Mr Bradbury forgets to include when he talks about the millions of pounds in council reserves, most of it is our schools’ budget, which reduces throughout the year as they draw money to run their individual schools from.

So which schools does he want to cut things from if he wants to spend it elsewhere?

Cllr Mark Aldred

Chairman of TfGM’s bus committee