Benches in Cornmarket Street, Oxford, to cost £30,000 each! I thought it was an April Fool's joke until I saw the date -- April 2.

In this City of Dreaming Spires, it appears that our elected councillors have been asleep and are now waking up to the 'rising' costs of Cornmarket. How can they justify the cost when they are so quick to make cuts that hit the weak?

We have now been told that neither Oxford City Council nor Oxfordshire County Council will accept responsibility for the rocketing costs.

I am amazed that Colin Cook, the city's executive member for planning, has the audacity to shift the blame on the public by saying they backed the design.

No doubt the final 'judgment' will have to go before 'the bench'.

They say that laughter is a good medicine to forget one's troubles. Will Oxford, the seat of learning, gain a new title -- the seat of leaning?

VIM RODRIGO

Rivermead Road

Rose Hill

Oxford