Owl refuses to publish the EDDC press release that triggered the comment below. Owl considers it a brazen example of “post truth” spin. Suffice to say he tries to twist the situation where he and two other councillors gatecrashed a “Save our Seafront” meeting.

Here is an organiser’s response:

“Councillor Skinner’s press release of 05/12/16 is full of mistruths. In terms of clarification, the meeting Councillor Skinner [attended] was advertised as ‘all welcome’, however it was not advertised as a public meeting but as a Save Exmouth Seafront (SES) meeting in which we were welcoming along new supporters following the large numbers who attended our protest march. I don’t think that gives Cllr Skinner any legitimacy in his hijacking of the meeting – and hijack he did. If he wanted to attend a public meeting to genuinely engage, why did he arrive unannounced so no questions could be formulated ahead of the meeting? He attended and DISRUPTED what was a SES meeting, and judging by accounts of his behaviour – he had no intention to listen to those present anyway.

I have been trying since July to organise a public Q&A session with Cllr Skinner; the idea being for ALL members of the public to be able to attend and put questions to him, not only the supporters of SES. That he attended uninvited and unannounced and simply disrupted a SES meeting does NOT count as public engagement!

If Cllr Skinner was genuinely hoping to use this meeting as an opportunity to engage, the overriding question has to be, why did he not contact the organisers of the meeting, including myself, for I was emailing him in the preceding week asking him to clarify his intent ref the public Q&A? My emails of the preceding week would have been a perfect opportunity for him to tell me he intended to attend the SES meeting. Instead he utterly ambushed the meeting and acted rudely towards many who were in attendance, I therefore take serious issue with him now trying to paint this as a public engagement exercise.”