Sir, The letter published by Sara Davidson (“Same Party”) on March 4 made two claims.  The first, against me personally, is factually incorrect.

My own earlier letter of February 18 never stated that Wallingford needed a second swimming pool. I simply requested that South Oxfordshire District Council carry out the requirements resulting from its own studies and to conduct the feasibility study which it previously “strongly recommended”. 

Approaching 1,000 new homes are planned for the town and it is high time that the council demonstrated its commitment to understanding the need for infrastructure.  I used this as an example of the short-sighted behaviour of the council in agreeing to new homes without understanding associated needs.

Her second claim is also not wholly correct.  As of this date, UKIP (alongside the other major parties) has not yet published a manifesto. She is correct that UKIP feels that the department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) should be abolished. 

This does not mean we seek to abolish funding for sport and leisure activities. We believe that funding for sport is better administered by the Department for Education, whilst that for Media should go to the department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS).

UKIP fundamentally believes in “Small Government”.  We do not think that we need an entire department running up its own administrative costs when most functions can be better handled by other departments.

You might very well like to ask if the Minister for Broadband were embedded in BIS instead of DCMS, he would have had more influence over the relevant businesses to have them install broadband for his constituents. 

As it is, our current Minister for Broadband (one Ed Vaizey of DCMS) has hundreds of constituents in Didcot waiting more than a year for this basic service to be delivered by business.

Lee Upcraft, UKIP Parliamentary Candidate for the Wantage Constituency