“WE want our voices heard. I’m glad the Chronicle is here.” So said a member of the public at a meeting to discuss West View House and the escalating anti-social behaviour by some of its residents.

As our front page story outlines, neighbours of the hostel have been suffering appalling disturbance in recent months. Two meetings have been held in private and on Tuesday there was a third. The Chronicle got wind of the meeting and turned up, to the consternation of the public officials there. As with most council officers they are happiest working in private away from the public gaze. This is not to criticise these particular city and county officials per se, it is a failing of most British public bodies that they see knowledge as power and the fewer the number of people who have it the better. But the public wanted the Chronicle to attend to ensure public accountability on the part of these publicly-paid officers. Eventually the officials realised the daftness of their stance and relented.

READ MORE HERE: Anger over out of control ex-offenders' hostel blighting neighbours' lives

So this issue is now fully in the open and can be aired. West View House is long-established trying to set offenders back on the path to sorting their lives out. It has had many successes but at the moment is teetering on the edge. There appears to be a lack of effective management and a weak policy that allows offenders to return to live at the hostel after serving a prison sentence. Readers of this newspaper will see that not a week goes by without a resident of West View House in Hyde Gate being sentenced in court mainly for shop lifting. At the moment the hostel appears to be little more than a doss house for hardened criminals who clearly don’t want to be rehabilitated. Its operators A2 Dominion need to justify why it should remain open.