Monthly Archives: March 2015

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7 Mar 2015

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Democracy, EDDC, Transparency

Freedom of Information – not really, if you ask EDDC

Twenty-five Freedom of Information requests appear on just the first page of EDDC’s pages on the “whatdotheyknow” website.

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/body/east_devon_district_council

13 of them (some nearly a month old) are “awaiting classification” and until they are “classified” nothing happens

2 have been successful

1 (recent one) is awaiting a response

9 are “awaiting internal review” (i.e. refused but request made to review it as you cannot go on to complain to the Information Commissioner)

So, more than one-third of requests have been refused. See the link to see what these cover.

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7 Mar 2015

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EDDC, Knowle/Honiton/Exmouth relocation

Knowle maintenance – planned deterioration – the figures

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/251720/response/616882/attach/html/2/Knowle%20building%20maintenance%20costs%20FOI%2009%2002%2015.xls.html

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7 Mar 2015

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General Election

A Conservative-Labour coalition suggests Tory Lord Baker

Conservative peer Lord Baker has suggested that it might be a good idea to have a Conservative-Labour coalition. The BBC’s “Have Your Say” site has this as its top comment from members of the public:

“Don’t do a deal – just break up party politics and let ALL MP’s vote on behalf of their electorate and not their party.” (Commentator “Ivanhoe)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-31776943

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6 Mar 2015

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Claire Wright, DCC, East Devon Tories, Ottery St Mary

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Tory dirty tricks?

https://susiebond.wordpress.com/2015/03/06/hes-behind-you/

Shameful – politics before people, politics before common sense, politics before the safety of children.

How can you sleep at night, councillors?

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6 Mar 2015

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Claire Wright, East Devon Tories, General Election, Hugo Swire

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Is Hugo Swire piggy-backing on Claire Wright’s campaigns?

Hugo Swire’s web site lists the things he is most proud of having done in East Devon recently but it seems to mirror many of the campaigns that Claire Wright has been involved with in the four years since she has been an East Devon councillor and even before that. The full list is:

– My coffee morning at Kennaway House
(Conservative Party fundraiser)

– The opening of Culver House’s new garden room
(brief appearance and photo opportunity)

– Public meetings on planning
because he finally realised that his constituents are as mad as hell – Claire Wright has been pushing this issue for YEARS and almost certainly knows more about local planning issues than he ever will.

– The opening of the new premises of Sheds Direct Devon
(Swire says he got EDDC to reverse a planning decision (based in part on poor access) about this company in Whimple even though he has not spoken up about any other planning issues since he was elected in 2010 (e.g. massive overdevelopment) – which Claire Wright has done for YEARS and YEARS, even before she became a councillor.

– I call on EDDC to put their plans to relocate on hold
simply a press release – Claire Wright has been campaigning on this for years – in the face of massive EDDC Tory councillor opposition) – Hugo announced his view only AFTER EDDC Tories had taken the decision to relocate.

– I take the campaign to save Ottery Hospital’s beds straight to the Secretary of State for Health
because as a Minister he says he cannot speak about East Devon in Parliament so his meetings, if any, have to take place behind closed doors – Claire Wright has held many, many local (open and poblic) consultations and attended many meetings on this issue for MONTHS since hospital closures were mooted.

– I welcome the news that the beavers will remain on the River Otter
Claire Wright has campaigned tirelessly ever since they were identified and has liaised with DEFRA and Devon Wildlife Trust to ensure that they remain on the river.

– I welcome a cash boost for East Devon’s school buildings
buildings that have been allowed to deteriorate for years and for which Claire Wright continually points out are stretched to capacity because of over-development.

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6 Mar 2015

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East Devon Tories, EDDC

East Devon Alliance throws down gauntlet to East Devon Tories

http://www.exeterexpressandecho.co.uk/East-Devon-Conservatives-challenged-pre-election/story-26130143-detail/story.html

For Chairman Paul Arnott’s challenge see:

http://www.eastdevonalliance.org.uk/

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6 Mar 2015

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Democracy, Development Management Committee, East Devon Alliance, EDDC, Environment (local), General Election, Knowle/Honiton/Exmouth relocation, Latest news

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‘Better use of facilities’ at Knowle than making it a retirement community!

Display 3

EDDC’s announcement in today’s Sidmouth Herald, of its preferred buyer for Knowle, could have massive repercussions, not least at the May District Council election.The plan is to change this prime employment site, and shrink the surrounding historic  parkland, to make a residential development exclusively not for young people. The purpose is to relocate the District Council offices, to a much older building (Exmouth Town Hall) requiring major refurbishment, and a not-yet-built office at Honiton.
Here’s just one local conversation on the topic https://www.streetlife.com/conversation/3h3lq15pbi7i/

Photo supplied by https://sidmouthindependentnews.wordpress.com

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6 Mar 2015

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Exmouth

A different use for a Premier Inn or Travelodge

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-31756845

Seems nothing has changed since 2014:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2776305/Group-Asylum-seekers-Premier-Inn-hotel-cost-taxpayers-2-500-night.html

Or even 2013:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2332481/Travelodges-Premier-Inns-used-house-homeless-families-weeks-time-spending-emergency-accommodation-spirals.html

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6 Mar 2015

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Affordable and Social Housing, EDDC, Local Plan, Transparency

About – turn! And when is an instruction not an instruction in EDDC-land?

So, the housing figures ARE to be published because our Planning Inspector says they are NOT politically sensitive:

http://new.eastdevon.gov.uk/news/2015/03/strategic-housing-market-assessment-shma-report-to-be-published-prior-to-local-elections/

In yesterday’s Express and Echo Leader of EDDC Paul Diviani is quoted as saying: “Mr Thickett [the Planning Inspector in charge of our Local Plan – the man who threw the last version out] did not specifically instruct the council to publish the figures before the election but, in response to a suggestion that the matter might end up being delayed by the elections, he said he expected the council to get on with it at the earliest opportunity.”

Just a few words were missing there. What Mr Thickett said was: “I will need to see evidence of any proposed changes [to the Local Plan, which includes the new housing figures] as soon as they have been agreed AND BY MID APRIL AT THE LATEST. Yours, etc …

Now, that sounds very much like an instruction to us!

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5 Mar 2015

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South Somerset

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Fairies ignore planning rules in South Somerset …

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/the-somerset-village-thats-having-to-put-a-stop-to-more-than-100-fairy-doors-appearing-in-the-woods-10086135.html?origin=internalSearch

perhaps shared CEO Mark Williams can get it sorted before the elections, unless, of course, it’s politically sensitive!

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5 Mar 2015

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Democracy

Council meeting boring, councillor? Try reading a golfing magazine or doing Scrabble

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/tory-councillor-snapped-reading-golf-5270315

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/liberal-democrat-councillor-caught-playing-5281521

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5 Mar 2015

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General Election

MPs: no free dinners, TV licenses or pre-11 pm taxis after 8 May!

“MPs will be banned from claiming expenses for dinners, TV licences and pre-23:00 taxis after May’s election, the expenses watchdog has said.

The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) proposed the curbs in 2013 as part of a wider package that included salaries rising from £67,000 to £74,000.

The salary rise is still subject to review from the party leaders.

But Ipsa said the cuts to expenses would go ahead on 8 May anyway.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-31745814

Bet a few of them will spin their dinners out until after 11 pm.

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5 Mar 2015

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Affordable and Social Housing, NPPF

“How we lost the plot on housebuilding”

Evening Standard city journalist makes some interesting observations on the housing market:

…”The recession has put most of these [small builders who used to be the mainstay of the housing market] out of business and they can’t get started again because they can’t obtain finance from the banks. As a result, today three quarters of Britain’s homes are built by a handful of large market-listed companies.

The chief executives of these companies do not want to build vast numbers of homes and risk depressing the market.

Instead — and some are quite open about this — they want to build as few homes as they can sensibly get away with because that it is the best way to keep prices high, profit margins up and their shareholders happy.

Far from embracing the free market and competition, they are behaving like monopolists and rationing supply — as Adam Smith predicted businessmen would when they thought they could get away with it.

There is another aspect to this. Because these quoted housebuilders are vast, they are only interested in big developments.

That means most of those inner-city brownfield sites and derelict industrial parks clearly visible on any train journey out of the capital — or indeed any provincial city — are of little interest to them because they are too small and because clearing toxic waste from brownfield sites is a lot more expensive that bulldozing a nice clean bit of agricultural land or a former playing field.

So the derelict sites stay derelict and pressure builds on the green belt.” …

http://www.standard.co.uk/business/markets/anthony-hilton-how-weve-lost-the-plot-on-housebuilding-10088862.html

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5 Mar 2015

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EDDC, Knowle/Honiton/Exmouth relocation

Real Zorro on Knowle relocation

Very detailed analysis (including the duplicated pages that EDDC didn’t spot:

http://realzorro1.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/knowle-sale-11-march-eddccabinet-papers.html

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5 Mar 2015

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Austerity cuts, EDDC

A conundrum

Can you say that council tax has been frozen if you are providing fewer services for the same money? Surely, if you are providing fewer services then council tax should go down, then you can claim it’s frozen.

Fewer services, same council tax = rise.

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5 Mar 2015

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Democracy, EDDC, Phil Twiss

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EAST DEVON TORY CULL?

Sheriff

(please note this is a Microsoft clip art cartoon of a sheriff, freely available for download throughout the world and is highly unlikely to be considered as threatening by any police force anywhere – if it is, best take it up with Microsoft – we are assured that no real guns were used in the drawing of this cartoon which depicts a cartoon gun with no real bang and no ability to hurt anyone at all anywhere and it has no connection whatsoever with any prophets anywhere)

We already knew that several Tory councillors have been “de-selected” from the East Devon Conservatives’ list of candidates for the May 7 election, for refusing to toe the party line.

Now we hear from several reliable sources that warning letters have also been sent to another group of cowering Conservatives telling them to “pull their socks up” – or else!

The bearer of this unwelcome news? None other than the weighty Phil “I’ve never whipped anyone in my life” Twiss.

Readers will remember that Cllr Twiss was widely ridiculed last year for complaining to the police that Independent Claire Wright had a comment on her blog calling for – yes!- a cull of East Devon Tories.

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4 Mar 2015

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Democracy, EDDC, Transparency

Now we know EDDC’s insipration: “The North Korean School of Management”!

“Many badly run organisations tend towards what can be termed the “North Korean” school of management; a culture of secrecy, with as little information as possible allowed out, and a generally hostile attitude towards anyone from outside questioning the prevailing culture.”

So runs the first paragraph in today’s editorial in the The Independent …

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/editorials/a-medical-horror-story-the-failures-at-morecambe-bay-are-shocking-and-must-never-happen-again-but-the-nhs-can-be-restored-to-health-10083710.html?origin=internalSearch

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4 Mar 2015

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Claire Wright, General Election, Hugo Swire

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“Out of touch MPs don’t get it”

“Too few politicians in Britain have any idea what life is like for people living on benefits, the former head of the Civil Service has warned, criticising ministers who send their children to public schools and have private health care rather than use the NHS. In an outspoken attack Lord (Gus) O’Donnell said there were still “too many people in politics who just don’t get it” and called for political parties to select candidates using open primaries to broaden representation in Parliament.

And he criticised the “few” Government ministers who, he said, still did not use the public services they were in charge of delivering.

…“There are unfortunately too many people in politics who just don’t get it; who just don’t understand what life on benefits would be like,” he said. Recalling his time as press secretary to Sir John Major, Lord O’Donnell said Sir John repeatedly emphasised that “we need to really care about public services”, but was often met with opposition from ministers who would ask: “Why should we bother about that? Our people don’t use them.”

“Many badly run organisations tend towards what can be termed the “North Korean” school of management; a culture of secrecy, with as little information as possible allowed out, and a generally hostile attitude towards anyone from outside questioning the prevailing culture.”

So runs the first paragraph in today’s editorial in the The Independent …

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/editorials/a-medical-horror-story-the-failures-at-morecambe-bay-are-shocking-and-must-never-happen-again-but-the-nhs-can-be-restored-to-health-10083710.html?origin=internalSearch