I really don't appreciatte that sort of remark.

This meeting is a far more of an achievement in terms of public involvement than some seem to comprehend – it is a unique precedent, and it is accompanied by the recent installed access to comprehensive reporting of Silbury via the EH website.

Perhaps two hours isn't much considering how much event punctuated time has slipped by, but not only is the 'long kept in the dark public' now far more informed (even if only by the EH spin version), they have also been afforded the opportunity of being heard.

Perhaps the attendance numbers aren't representative, but at least a small cross-section of the public consisting of all manner of lay enthusiasts and regional residents that have an archaeological, historic, scientific, spiritual, cultural, or just plain aesthetic interest from the 'informed want to no more' to the 'know little love Silbury' can discuss with fully informed professionals and academics. They can even rub shoulders with people that they could in few circumstances access, including eminent names only known to the public through television and books, reports and magazines.

Indeed not everything can be said or answered in two hours, yet it is plenty enough time for the serious discussion focused on fixing Silbury and the democratic process of informing and involving the public to be damaged by an individuals with a personal or deluded agenda. I of course hope in the interests of Silbury they exercise self-restraint, but I would rather see them afforded their democratic rights than the public at large be ignored.

This right to be informed and heard was fought long and hard for in the face of well organised coordinated official opposition. It has taken five years of intense research, innumerable letters, regular meetings, and way-outnumbered face-to-face arguments, accompanied by little encouragement but plenty of carping and quipping. It should have happened as a matter of course, but it would not have happened at all had it been left to EH.

VBB