This letter was published in the Echo this week:

Sorry all of you dreamers about Southend becoming a “City of Culture”.

Let us be honest it is a city in name only.

No remarkable buildings to boast of - those that we had have been destroyed by successive councils and replaced with hideous structures that fit nowhere within the actual Victorian background that we inherited from our forbears.

Read more >>> Southend's City of Culture bid could be scrapped over fears it will cost £2m

And please, if you can, point out some features that approach being “cultural”.

As usual Southend is trying to be above its station - a malady that it has suffered since it became a borough.

Instead of wasting £2 million (and more) on pursuing this dream, let reality take over and use the money to repair our already-broken town.

Robert Perrin

Southend-on-Sea