Daily Archives: 1 Sep 2016

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1 Sep 2016

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Democracy, Lobbying, Spin

“Bonanza of Brexit Lobbying” including £3,000 to be in Theresa May’s company

“The Conservatives are selling access to Theresa May and other ministers for more than £3,000 a head to corporate executives and lobbyists at their party conference this autumn.

The executives will pay for the chance to attend a lunch session with the prime minister and a dinner with the chancellor, as well as more intimate “round table” sessions with ministers relevant to their industry.

The practice of charging corporate executives for access to ministers emerged under David Cameron, with the “business day” originally priced at around £1,000 a head for a session with the former prime minister and chancellor.

A new corporate brochure for the Tory party conference shows the price for attending the business day and dinner has now surged to £3,150 per person for the chance to be in the presence of May and her new government ministers.

The prime minister is listed as giving a question and answer session over lunch, with pictures of past events showing ministers mingling on tables with businesspeople.

In separate sessions, three Treasury ministers will host a talk billed as “Treasury insights” and business ministers will host a “partnering with business” session.

The website advertising the event features a picture of May, along with the claim that business day “offers representatives from the business community the opportunity to engage in discussion with senior Conservative politicians”.

May’s decision to participate in the event hints that she is not intending to break from Cameron’s previous approach to lobbying, despite her claims to want to run a country for the many not the few and tackle “vested interests” in the corporate world.

Tamasin Cave of the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Spinwatch, said it was “very concerning and worrying” that May was planning to “continue with politics as normal under David Cameron”.

She said there is a “bonanza of Brexit lobbying” coming down the tracks for May to deal with at a time when the public has little faith that politicians will stand up to powerful corporate interests.

“People do not trust establishment politicians on this issue of lobbying. She has a big problem on her hands, which she does not seem to understand,” Cave said.

Asked about the event selling access to May and other ministers, a Conservative spokesman said: “This is an important opportunity to engage directly with businesses and to highlight how, as part of our plan to create an economy that works for everyone, we will continue to back business and enterprise.”

Labour also has a “business forum” founded at around the same time, charging around £899 for a ticket and giving access to unspecified “politicians and leading businesspeople”.

The Lib Dem corporate event has gone down in price since the party declined in influence and left government, with a ticket costing just £240 to attend compared with £800 for their business day and £350 for their business dinner in 2014.

May will face calls to clamp down on lobbying next week, when Lord Brooke, a Labour peer, tables a private member’s bill arguing for the replacement of the current ineffective lobbying register with a genuine register that records who people are lobbying, their client, the type of influence they are seeking and how much they are spending.

Unlock Democracy, a campaign group, said the bill would bring the UK into line with other institutions such as the US, EU and Scotland.

“It’s time for Theresa May to put clear blue water between her and Cameron. She can set the tone for her premiership by backing real lobbying transparency,” it said.”

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/sep/01/lunch-with-theresa-may-thatll-will-be-3150

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1 Sep 2016

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Democracy, Progressive Alliance

“Progressive Alliance only alternative to Tories”

“… It is going to be very hard to get a progressive pact to happen. Jeremy Corbyn, who one might have expected to have been sympathetic to the idea, has seemingly ruled it out – even for the specific case of Caroline Lucas, the Green Mp for Brighton, who is much closer to Corbyn politically than the great majority of Labour MPs.

But to be fair to Corbyn, he is in the middle of a bruising leadership election. It would be challenging for the Leader of the Opposition, in the middle of such an election campaign, to come out in favour of acting with other parties. It would have required great vision and bravery.

Corbyn is highly likely to win the leadership election. Once he has done so, and with Labour almost certainly continuing to struggle internally and in the opinion polls, then my bet is that he will think again, and start to face reality: without a progressive alliance, Labour will be destroyed by the Conservatives. But with such an alliance, a better future is possible.” …

http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/2988069/progressive_alliance_is_now_the_only_alternative_to_the_tories.html

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1 Sep 2016

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EDDC, Feniton/ Talaton, Villages BUAB

Feniton village boundary: putting the record straight

From the blog of Feniton district councillor Susie Bond:

“Development in Feniton always excites comment, but I was especially disappointed to read an ill-informed, anonymous letter in the September issue of Feniton’s parish magazine.

It’s all too easy to set rumours running and temperatures rising, by which time of course the damage is done. However, this letter was so unhelpful, I thought it needed addressing paragraph by paragraph:

“I was surprised to receive details of the so called proposed changes in Feniton’s Built Up Boundary through an e-mail from a local estate agent.”

Why would an estate agent have any interest in Feniton’s Built Up Area Boundary (to give it its proper name)? Unless of course the correspondent meant a ‘planning agent’, i.e. developer, who of course would have a vested interest in moving the site in question to within the boundary.

“There is a large piece of land to the east of Ottery Road leading up to the station which has been the home to some dilapidated greenhouses for as long as I can remember having lived in the village for nearly fifteen years and as far as I know throughout this time, this land has been included in Feniton’s Built up Boundary.”

This paragraph is probably the only paragraph that is factually correct.

“Why suddenly do I hear of a proposal to take it outside the Built-up Boundary and who exactly proposed this. There is no point in pretending that further development will not occur in Feniton at some point to come, but I do object to this eleventh hour clandestine approach to remove a site that has always been earmarked for such further development without understanding who and what reasons are behind such a proposal.”

I posted a blog about this on 9 August (https://susiebond.wordpress.com/2016/08/09/planning-policy-strengthened-in-east-devon/), and of course EDDC’s proposed changes have been discussed extensively, including at the monthly public meeting of Feniton Parish Council on 11 July (minuted in the August issue of the parish magazine). There is nothing ‘clandestine’ about any of this, and the author seems not to understand what a Built Up Area Boundary (BUAB) actually is. It does not, for example, designate areas for development.

The proposed BUAB also draws a line tightly around the current Wainhomes estate, i.e. making it harder for Wainhomes to build the hundred or so more houses it wants to there.

“Essentially such a proposal, if successful will once again leave the rest of the village wondering nervously where further inevitable development will take place.”

Had the correspondent undertaken some elementary research, including on the Villages Development Plan Document (DPD) to which he refers, a lot of this scare mongering could have been avoided.

For example, the Villages DPD is an ancillary document underpinning the Local Plan. Planning policy in East Devon, outlined in the newly adopted Local Plan, is for development to be prioritised around Cranbrook, where there is easy access to employment within the thriving city of Exeter. Indeed, the draft East Devon Villages DPD makes clear just how unsuited Feniton is to mass development.

The decision to site the black line (proposed boundary) for Feniton as it is shown in the parish magazine and in my 9 August blog was taken by EDDC following extensive discussions by a team of planning policy officers and no-one else. Not landowners, not developers, not District Councillors, not Parish Councillors, not the residents of villages who may/may not own land they wish to propose for development. The planners undertook a full site assessment (the results of this exercise can be found through a link on my blog of 9 August).

The Built-Up Area Boundary is for consultation at this stage, but the black lines drawn on the map will only move if there is strong evidence that they should do so. I feel sure that the anonymous correspondent will put in a submission to EDDC voicing his views … although he should be aware that if he does this, he will lose his anonymity.

East Devon is not looking to increase development in Feniton for the time being. This position will undoubtedly change in the future, but the decision as to where development should take place will have to take into account Feniton’s emerging Neighbourhood Plan.

I would urge the anonymous correspondent to come along to Feniton Parish Council meetings where there are frank and open discussions. Using the parish magazine to needlessly raise inaccurate and misleading stories only fuels the fires of rumour and gossip.”

https://susiebond.wordpress.com/2016/09/01/confusion-in-feniton-over-villages-plan-consultation/

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1 Sep 2016

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Accountability, Exmouth, Moirai Exmouth project, Regeneration

Moirai – not quite an Oasis in Swindon

We know from various FOIs that EDDC’s Alison Hayward (who has the terribly impressive title of “Strategic Lead – Organisational Development and Transformation) has had a number of meetings with Moirai, EDDC’s (previously??) erstwhile preferred partner for the Splash/Queens Drive development in Exmouth, and that she appears to have been only EDDC officer present at some such meetings.

We also know that six, as yet unidentified, Exmouth Town Councillors had a visit to the Swindon Oasis Leisure centre. This centre appears to have been portrayed as a model of what can be achieved in partnership with Moirai.

In an effort to keep councillors fully informed on all aspects of Moirai, may we draw attention to the latest Private Eye and its Rotten Boroughs column.

It reports:

HEALTH WARNING
Swimmers hoping to cool off in Swindon’s Oasis pool have been stricken with a nasty bug called cryptosporidiosis – aka “crypto” – which triggers diarrhoea, fever and nausea. Of some 30 recent cases in the town at least 10 have been positively linked to the Oasis, which is outsourced to Greenwich Leisure Ltd.

Yet the council and Greenwich Leisure kept the pool open for three weeks after being warned there was a problem with the water.

A mother alerted environmental health after her son became ill on 19th July, but the pool was not closed until 12th August.

Public Health England has confirmed that some of the reported cases of infection from the pool date back to May.

This is not unfamiliar ground for Greenwich Leisure. It runs Chesham Leisure Centre in Buckinghamshire on behalf of Chiltern District Council. Eleven children and four adults were hospitalised after swimming there in 2014. An investigation found they had been affected by the chemical content of the water, which Greenwich had failed to test. In the same year 800 residents of Reading signed a petition protesting at the “filthy” Greenwich-run Rivermead leisure centre in the town.

What the Private Eye story doesn’t say is that Moirai run the Oasis at Swindon and that they are still engaged in the possible development of another part of Swindon known as the North Star development.

They used to outsource the day to day management to a company created by two of their directors and called Oasis Operations Ltd.

The two Moirai directors ceased to be directors of Oasis Operations Ltd in February 2013. A Mr Wojeichowski became the sole director and later changed the name to MW Contract Services Ltd. That company went bust in January 2014. Greenwich Leisure subsequently took over the day to day running of Oasis.