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Welwyn Garden City councillor slams Women’s Tour stage as “frittering away” taxpayers’ moneyLizzie Armitstead wins 2013 nats road race (picture Alex Whitehead:SWPIX.COM)

Welwyn Garden City councillor slams Women’s Tour stage as “frittering away” taxpayers’ money

"I can't get litter bins" says Martyn Levitt...
by John Stevenson
Mon, Feb 17, 2014 11:09
33

Welwyn Garden City councillor Martyn Levitt has criticised Welwyn Hatfield Council’s spending £50,000 to host the second-last stage of The Women’s Tour on May 10.

He told Ewan Foskett of Welwyn Hatfield Times “When I have been a councillor for Haldens [Welwyn Garden City] I have wanted to get litter bins and I can’t get litter bins, I’m told we don’t have money.

“But we have money to fritter away on this.”

He said that he did not think the event was “giving good value for people who are paying council tax”.

Councillor Levitt,a member of the majority Tory group on the council, is stepping down at May’s election. Described as a keen cyclist, he said he did not think hosting the finish of the race would help promote sport in the area.

“The Tour of Britain had Bradley Wiggins and Mark Cavendish, household names,” he said.

“It got very little television coverage, what hope is there [the women’s tour] will raise £50,000?

“[Council leader] John Dean has said they will get sponsorship, I don’t think they will, if they thought they would it would be referred to in the budget.”

The Women’s Tour starts in Oundle on Wednesday May 7, and finishes in Bury St Edmunds on Sunday May 11. Welwyn Garden City hosts the finish of stage four, which starts in Cheshunt.

Women's Tour
Welwyn Garden City
Sweetspot
John Stevenson

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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33 comments

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stealth | 10 years ago
0 likes

Living in Fenland, I'm planning to take the day off for the first day & getting to Bury St Eds for the last day.
I really don't know the reasoning behind some of the misogynistic posts on here, it will be a very high quality field, the World & Olympic Champion will be there, amongst the very best in the world. Does it get any better than that?

Avatar
LauraQ replied to mattsccm | 10 years ago
0 likes
mattsccm wrote:

People go on about the money eared but how much of that 50k will go back to the council. Until that can be 100% proved before the event there has to be some doubt. Has to be.
Of course you cannot guarantee this. Most definitely needs a vote!

If we have to have a vote for every £50k spent by our local councils, we'll be permanently chained to the polling station. This is a tiny amount in the scheme of things and the council will have done the maths, regardless of one ignorant councillors' comments. As for comments about lack of interest in women's cycling, get out to events and see the reality. Women's competitive cycling is a huge success story for GB.

Avatar
skippy | 10 years ago
0 likes

WGC could spend the money on redesigning litter bins , then see if ANYBODY will come visit ? Fat chance !

50k spent on the Ladies Race , is a better bet than on a Mens Event , any day ! Novelty value alone , is a plus and the interest will lead to many more Reluctant Sponsors , realising that they have missed Too Many Opps in the past .

What is going on here , is a Councillor trying to buy a few votes! Shame on him for such a petty attack on the Women !

Local Women should immediately start shopping in the neighbouring Constituencies , they decide where the household budget goes , then lets see to what tune Martyn dances ?

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