Sir – How sad to read yet again of the myopic view of West Oxfordshire district councillors taking a decision against the opportunity to turn a Witney industrial unit into a theatre for the training of Witney’s youth (Gazette, July 18), in favour of cash in the bank by renting the facility to a business.

In case the councillors haven’t noticed, Witney is virtually devoid of cultural assets.

There cannot be another town in the UK with about 25,000 inhabitants that doesn't have a theatre.

We all must travel to Oxford, Banbury, Thame, Cheltenham, Abingdon and Chipping Norton to see live theatre or listen to a concert.

Even the surrounding villages around Witney appear to have more cultural activity. Richard Langridge, the cabinet member for local economy and communities and, I see from the council website, who is also responsible for culture, said “that it was a tough decision but looking at it from a financial perspective, this is in everyone’s interest.”

We can obviously rely on him to push through future cultural projects in the town. Robin Martin-Oliver, the man behind the theatre project, should be given every encouragement.

His Stagecoach facility provides marvellous training for children to learn and improve their talent in song, dance and acting.

We hope it won’t be too long before he can find another suitable venue. And on another cultural calamity, can anybody explain why Witney’s singular historical heritage, of Early’s Witney Blanket Company, was completely swept away, with not a marker of its existence in sight?

Surely part of the new housing development that replaced the site could have incorporated a museum proudly displaying the engine of Witney’s development in the Industrial Revolution, instead of locking away a few photographs of the company in Witney’s sad little museum, tucked away down an alleyway as if the town is ashamed of it.

J Whittle (Mr), Plum Lane, Shipton-under-Wychwood