The Minister for Urban Services, David Lamont, said yesterday that letter from the accountants of the La Grange in Franklin Street had put the lie to Opposition statements that red tape had prevented the closure of Franklin Street for New Year’s Eve. Mr Lamont said the letter from Bates and Pickering endorsed the Government’s position that the street only be closed with the agreement of traders themselves _ something which the owners of La Grange and Opposition Leader Kate Carnell had failed to secure. He issued a copy of the undated letter seeking withdrawal of the request for temporary closure because of inability to get the public-liability insurance of $10 million per incident required by the department; failure by traders to give firm undertakings to meet the costs of closure leaving the Grange to be saddled with the costs; some traders reversing their position and being openly hostile to the closure; the requirement by the department made on December 21 for portable toilets to be installed. Mr Lamont said the letter had noted that departmental officers had been helpful. Mrs Carnell said that in fact the letter supported her position that the traders had been happy to have the street temporarily closed on New Year’s Eve if it could be done cheaply and easily by putting up some barricades, getting some security staff and cleaning up any mess. Once the department had started insisting on costly and unrealistic public-liability insurance and for portable toilets of course some of the traders changed their minds. Red tape had prevented the orderly closure of the street around 6pm. The proof of her position was that the police had had to close the street before midnight for public-safety reasons in any event. They had done so without public-liability insurance and without portable toilets, and had done it in the face of likely political flak because they knew the Government was opposed to a closure. The traders had only wanted closure for public safety and to generate a fun atmosphere without cars; they had not wanted to increase their licence areas.