I couldn't believe what I was reading with the article Fears over relief road inquiry' (Echo, April 16) or, more sadly, I could believe it, because it is, frankly, all we have come to expect.

Jim Knight MP accuses opponents of the scheme of using every trick in the book' - by which I presume he means calling for an open and honest debate at a public inquiry about the pros and cons of this scheme where all the true facts and figures can at last be aired.

In fact, Mr Knight shouldn't be afraid of a public inquiry - it will provide an unbiased decision and if his claims for the merits of this road outweigh the disadvantages, then the scheme will be given the go-ahead.

Amazingly, he still seems to believe that the success of the 2012 Olympics is somehow tied in with the building of this road when one of the factors in Weymouth winning this bid was precisely the fact that the use of cars to access the events would be drastically diminished and more sustainable alternatives relied upon instead.

I fail to see how Dorset County Council's support for this scheme "sends out a positive message'.

On the contrary, it sends out the message that the local authority is a weary old dinosaur with its head in the sand, whose only idea for moving people and traffic between Weymouth and Dorchester is an outdated plan to build a totally unnecessary road which will create many more problems than it will solve.

If it wanted to send out a positive message in time for the 2012 Olympics it should be fervently embracing the idea of presenting Weymouth and Portland as a forward-thinking, intelligent, imaginative, clean, green town where traffic and people move about with the minimum possible adverse impact on our health, stress levels and beautiful countryside.

When he says the issue has been determined locally' and the view of those accountable is clear - they want this relief road' - I take it he means all those councillors on the planning committee, who, like sheep, voted the way they were told to vote on April 5 by approving the scheme.

They did this instead of thinking for themselves to consider the pros and cons of this scheme and reflecting as our "democratically elected leaders" what we, the majority electorate want, which is 75 per cent of the local population manifestly opposed to this insane scheme which seeks to wield a giant sledgehammer to crack a tiny little nut.

Even more depressing is the realisation of how few of those councillors actually took the trouble to inform themselves properly of the issues before nodding through the scheme, as evidenced by one councillor who stated that he didn't even understand the facts about climate change before going on to vote for a road which will increase carbon dioxide emissions by over 2,000 tonnes in the first year alone! Is that being "accountable"?

Mr Knight is right to say that he spends an awful lot of his time on this issue - he has to - he has staked his Westminster career on getting this scheme pushed through, regardless of the mayhem it will cause. We have local elections on May 3 - I call upon all those who oppose this destructive scheme to show their displeasure by voting out all those in our local government who approved it.

James Stewart, Dorchester Road, Weymouth.