Dear Sir,

Yet another government property has been allowed to deteriorate. Why have successive governments permitted so many buildings to deteriorate and, when it is too late, end up spending considerable amounts of taxpayers’ money to restore them to a habitable condition or demolishing them altogether?

When the British Navy left Bermuda, HMS Malabar was renovated some 20 years later at a cost of more than $1 million. Another property, the Parsonage, was being renovated by Edward Harris. Dr Harris’s lease was terminated and now it is in total disrepair.

The Wantley House property on Princess Street where the initial meetings were held for the formation of the Berkeley Institute was scheduled to be destroyed. Whether that has been saved, I don’t know, but what will be the cost?

All the schools that are to be closed on the education reorganisation scheme, what will happen to them? Maybe left empty and then bulldozed in another 20 years!

The old Warwick Secondary School was a relatively new school that was allowed to deteriorate through mismanagement. Why do non-government buildings many years older not have these problems? The maintenance people not doing their jobs are fired. The same should apply for government maintenance. This will not happen — a government job is one for life.

ANTONY SIESE

Paget