I write in response to your article on the motion I presented to Council last Wednesday.

The aim of my motion was two-fold: to seek clarity from the Government on their stance re this tax post Brexit and the allocation of the revenue raised and secondly to pay tribute to our Fresh as a Daisy charity here Bolton.

It was not politically motivated, in fact I stated that women had been let down on this issue by successive governments and I also stated that I was not indulging in any “blame games”, merely seeking clarity.

I also though that it was important that this issue was raised in public and talked about in a proactive and empathetic manner.

It’s a great pity that there is no live stream as this would have shown Cllr Cox’s face and demeanour during his speech, as well as his colleagues who surrounded him.

His manner was condescending and patronising with just a hint of boredom but underpinned by his and his colleagues' amusement.

They smirked and sniggered like a bunch of schoolchildren, trying to belittle me and my motion.

What they do not realise is that when they sought to belittle me and what I was saying, they also demeaned the women and girls I was speaking for.

As well as being offensive, Cllr Cox was also wrong. He said that there was no such thing as the “tampon tax” that his was part of my “progressive notion”.

If he has taken the trouble to research the subject and visit his own Government’s website, he would indeed see that they offer up an information page on the tampon tax and its history. He also stated that my figure of £12m was wrong and that it was £15m offered by the Government.

Wrong again, it had initially been £15m but was cut to £12m by the Chancellor, Phillip Hammond, in March 2017.

It is exactly this kind of careless disregard for the subject that so many women find offensive. Had he bothered to research rather than practise his stand up comedy routine, he might have presented a more cogent and accurate response.

Whilst I was very disappointed in Cllr Cox's response, I was staggered to see that every Tory woman voted against this motion, EVERY ONE.

Two of them even spoke against it. Cllr Adele Warren spoke against it, citing a list of shops who don’t charge the VAT on the products.

I did have this information but decided that telling women and girls where to shop when the problem is that they have no money is not only unproductive but insulting too.

We welcome this initiative by the companies concerned; but I was talking about girls as young as nine years old being in a state of distress in school because of lack of protection and Cllr Warren's closing comments in her speech were that if I “wanted to buy feminine products and was a little bit posh, shop at Waitrose”.

The lack of understanding and empathy was quite chilling.

I do advise that all women watch the debate on YouTube.com/watch?feature=share&v=npEYDYEqBqU

And remember ladies, the next time the Tories knock on your door and proudly tell you what they stand for, remember what they don’t stand for too.

Cllr Debbie Newall