THE planning and traffic control committee of Weymouth & Portland Borough Council is to be congratulated on its recent 7-4 decision to turn down the planning application to build a palm oil electric generating plant at Portland Port.

It was a classic example of how accountable local government should work.

They listened carefully to the articulate speeches of a well informed group of environmental speakers including the Green Party's South Dorset Parliamentary Candidate Brian Heatley.

Councillors then firmly rejected their officers' untenable recommendation for their elected members to ignore the unsustainable implications for the sourcing of the proposed plant's palm oil in south east Asia in coming to a decision.

They then voted accordingly. For once it was the elected members who decided and not their paid local government officer colleagues.

Contrast this to disgraceful decision by the Tory Cabinet at Dorset County Council earlier this month, to shut down Weymouth Women's Refuge next year.

In this case we had a misnamed unelected quango having their clueless advice, endorsed by a Conservative-controlled group, clearly whipped into line prior to the cabinet meeting and blatantly unwilling to listen to the well put arguments for keeping the refuge open.

The strength of local public outrage at this blindingly stupid decision is clearly something that these Conservative county councillors feel able to ignore.

Listening and accountable representation is apparently beyond the scope of their understanding of local democracy.

People are well aware that whichever 'Conservative' Government is elected under our undemocratic, fraud past the post system in 2010: be it Tory Party Mark 1 or Tory Party Mark 2 cuts in public expenditure will be high on the agenda.

However, local electors should now have no illusion as to the priorities of David Cameron's official Conservative Party and what voting for them will mean to vital and essential local public services such as Weymouth's women's refuge.

Isn't that perhaps a good reason for voting instead for one of the genuine alternatives to our two awful mainstream political parties?

No one has to vote either Labour or Conservative next year- consign them both to the electoral bin!

Richard Denton-White, Leader of the Citizens' Action Party(UK), Fortuneswell, Portland.