WE were walking through St Helens the other day and witnessed a lovely scene outside St Helens Town Hall where a couple were posing for pictures following their wedding.

Surrounded by their loved ones, it was beautiful to see.

Unfortunately, after walking on another 20 metres or so, the joyful atmosphere was interrupted by a flurry of shouts and f-words from a group gathered near benches beside the Queen Victoria statue.

They seemed in their own world, oblivious to the fact a wedding was going on - but it was still appalling and embarrassing (we were with our kids at the time).

And it’s not the first time I’ve witnessed it there, with street drinking clearly going on.

No doubt this is one of the reasons why the benches were moved from outside the town hall - but has that really solved the problem? It doesn’t seem to have.

My question is, what are the authorities doing to deal with this? A few arrests here and there... Is that solving the issue?

This is embarrassing for St Helens but I often wonder does anyone care these days? The state of the front of Wesley House, which is all cordoned off with fencing, beside which I’ve seen a load of rubbish and empty beer cans strewn across the ground.

Are people in levels of authority spending time walking the streets identifying this kind of issue, or are they cocooned away in an office somewhere (maybe working remotely miles away), unaware of what’s going on or ignoring the problem?

Name and address submitted