Incursion into Knowle’s Public Open Space “has never been debated by councillors”
and from more than one senior Honiton Councillor, at various stages of EDDC’s ill-starred (jinxed?) ‘road to relocation’ project. Remember this SIN post, anyone? https://sidmouthindependentnews.wordpress.com/2014/02/17/watchdog-kennelled/
How come, if a buyer for Knowle (Pegasus Life) was only recently chosen, all the paperwork is ready to sign, seal and deliver before the end of March?
No final decision had been made on 22 January 2015:
The successful bidder was announced on 4 March 2015:
http://www.midweekherald.co.uk/news/mystery_knowle_bidder_revealed_1_3978943
and within 3 weeks all will be signed and sealed.
3 weeks to flog Knowle, 4 plus years and counting to get a Local Plan and it’s still outstanding business – no special meetings, few extra resources.
Says a lot about how these resources are prioritised and where the money goes on all those (uncounted and unaccountable) officer hours.
The “Centre for Public Scrutiny” set up a National Overview and Scrutiny Forum:
“A National Overview and Scrutiny Forum was set up in 2007 to help develop Overview and Scrutiny in England and Wales. Each English region sends one officer representative, and one councillor representative, to the Forum. Wales sends one officer and one councillor representative as well.
The Forum is convened and facilitated by the Centre for Public Scrutiny but controls its own work programme and is driven by the needs and interests of O&S practitioners.”
So how effective has this Forum(remember, made up of councillors and officers) been in the run- up to local and general elections?
“At its meeting in April 2014, the Forum decided that it would take a break from meetings in person until after the 2015 General Election.”
Now, why would officers and councillors shut down a forum on overview and scrutiny 10 months before elections?
Wow, I would love to see the minutes of THAT meeting! So I click on the link for them:
http://www.cfps.org.uk/nosf-minutes-agenda
Whoops, nothing since 2013 but no fears there is a link from this archive page:
http://www.cfps.org.uk/?location_id=363
which takes you back to the earlier page in a loop where you start again … and again! This is SO like EDDC!
However, a note at the bottom says to call someone in the organisation. No reply.
Request for the minutes has now been made by email.
Transparency? Hmmm!
Questions:
How long has the current monitoring officer been in post?
Was the monitoring officer vacancy advertised prior to the current monitoring officer taking up the post, and if so where was it advertised? What are the monitoring officer’s qualifications?
Answer:
The post is currently a shared post with South Somerset District Ccouncil and this person is a qualified local government solicitor
Question:
In the last five years (February 2010 to February 2015) how many permanent vacancies have arisen?
How many of these have been advertised?
How many have been advertised on your website?
How many of these vacancies have not been advertised at all and on whose authority (job title)?
Answer:
This information is not tracked.
Source:
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/transparency_5#incoming-626302
An early example of EDDC’s valiant effort to engage the public was flagged up on the SIN blog https://sidmouthindependentnews.wordpress.com/2012/10/31/spot-the-knowle-consultation/
Click here for news of the most recent one : http://saveoursidmouth.com/2015/03/13/public-consultation-was-limited-to-two-ads-in-the-sidmouth-herald-admits-eddc-legal-officer/
Speaking in Argentina, he said that:
“Because many interests come into play in financing of an election campaign and then they ask you to pay back, so, the election campaign should be independent of anyone who may finance it.”
He went on to say:
“Many interests get into the mix, and then they send you the bill. Perhaps public financing would allow for me, the citizen, to know that I’m financing each candidate with a given amount of money”.
Everything, according to the Pope, “needs to be transparent and clean.”
Details here: April 21 National Day of Action CoVoP Poster
The Knowle event is being organised by two East Devon Alliance members, Ian McKintosh and Mike Temple, who have joined the National Community Voice On Planning (CoVoP) as trustees.
CoVoP is constantly working for reforms in the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), as this latest message shows:
‘Two letters from our members have appeared in the Telegraph this week – both were edited to remove references to CoVoP National Day of Action (12 April), but both expressed the key message that the Government is not listening to communities on planning. References to the 5 year plan supply have also been removed. The full text for both letters is here: letters to the Telegraph
Another member has written to Messers Betts, Pickles and Lewis expressing similar frustration.
“Dear Honourable Members
The NPPF is NOT working for local communities!
Further to the recent press release by the Communities & Local Government Select Committee on the operation of the NPPF I would like to draw your attention to further evidence that the NPPF is not protecting important local landscapes from inappropriate development and that Planning Officers appear to be ignoring sustainable planning principles outlined in the NPPF.
South Lakeland District Council (SLDC) planning officers regularly emphasise the ‘presumption in favour of development’ to their Planning Committee while failing to mention that all planning applications (even those for allocated sites in a Local Plan), must comply with core planning principles in the NPPF. These are outlined the NPPF (219 paragraphs) which also states (several times) that these sustainable planning principles are ‘material considerations’ when assessing planning applications.
At an SLDC Planning Committee meeting last December (attended by six out of 17 members), a planning application for a prime green field site, in the middle of Grange-over-Sands’ Conservation Areas, was granted. Committee members did not bother to discuss major infrastructure problems (drainage and roads), or the likely adverse impact on the town’s tourist economy. These problems had been raised at the meeting by local residents and Town Council representatives who also drew attention to the relevant paragraphs in the NPPF. No wonder people are losing faith in local planning procedures. This feels like a District Council dictatorship; not a local democracy.
We believe that District Councils are being ‘threatened’ with appeal cases by developers that they claim will be resolved in favour of granting planning permission. Also, we have evidence that our planning officers are also being pressurised into putting planning applications before the Planning Committee, due to perceived time constraints, even when the developer has not provided all the evidence needed to support their application such as an adequate flood risk assessment that considers the potential for flooding elsewhere.
We need more homes in areas where there are good employment prospects and good public transport links. We do not need them in areas with poor employment prospects, poor public transport links and inadequate infrastructure or where they will become second homes and have an adverse impact on Conservation Areas that are important to the local tourist economy.
I realise that you cannot do anything about specific issues raised above but I hope that the next Parliament will rectify some of the problems highlighted as a matter of urgency!
At the moment many of us do not know who to vote for at the next election because none of the main political parties have robust proposals for dealing with these serious planning inadequacies.
Yours sincerely”
We need to shout more loudly! Please demonstrate your frustration on 12 April.
Best wishes
Julie
Chairman of CoVoP
admin@covop.org
Community Voice on Planning
A National Alliance to provide communities with an effective voice on planning
http://www.covop.org’
Who obviously based his fictitious world on “Greater Exeter” – a flat disc balanced on the back of four elephants (East Devon, Exeter, Teignbridge and Mid-Devon) themselves balanced on a giant turtle (Devon) with a crazy capital called Ankh-Morpork (Exeter) – where only the City Watch (East Devon Watch) was able to keep a semblance of order and call the baddies to account!
“It’s not worth doing something unless someone, somewhere, would much rather you weren’t doing it”.
Knowle relocation continues apace. The sheep baah’d, the sheep voted and the sheep went home.
What are you?
A sheep:
or
a sheepdog:
A vote for Conservative at this election is a vote for sheep.
A vote for Independents at this election is a vote for sheepdogs!
East Devon Watch 