[SLUG] Bristol and Council tax

[Bob Garrood]

HI

I am sending a letter to the Scarborough Evening News.  It seems topical.  
Would anyone be interested in adding their signature?   Having more than one 
name helps to stop the paper dismissing you as a crank.

Constructive criticism or abuse on content, style and orthography are welcome.   

Here is the text:

The Editor
Scarborough Evening News

Sir

Council tax payers in Scarborough who pay by direct debit will now have become 
aware that their bank balances have just been reduced at the new increased 
rate.  

There is good news for council tax payers.  Money can be saved in one of the 
most expensive areas of administration.  Bristol Council has announced that 
it will migrate its computers from Microsoft Office applications (word 
processors, databases, spreadsheets and other common administration tasks), 
to software that uses open standards.  They have chosen to use Sun's 
StarOffice in preference to Microsoft Office.  StarOffice is one of many 
alternatives to Microsoft's products.  It is a commercial product that offers 
technical support. Bristol council have produced a report estimating that 
over the next 5 years this will reduce their IT costs from £1.7 million to 
£650,000.  This level of saving applied here would certainly impact future 
council tax levels, and might even enable a reduction.

Such savings are possible as StarOffice is based on a published open standard, 
Open Document Format. Any developer can implement this, so competition is 
possible and this ensures lower prices.  Many developers, including IBM and 
Sun already have produced alternative office suites that work.  Microsoft 
does not support this standard.

Moving to open standards will enhance local democracy.   We can all read and 
write to all local government documents because open source (free) versions  
of Open Document Format Office suites (as OpenOffice.org) are available.     
If you want one contact Scarborough's Linux user Group on:   
scarborough at mailman.lug.org.uk   .  Scarborough Borough Council and North 
Yorkshire County  Council should let us know their policy on Open Document 
Format now.

Details of Bristol council's  policy and a link to their analysis of costs are 
on: http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS6953189127.html  

Yours sincerely



Bob