Empty second homes are delaying Devon properties from getting gas restored

Carl Eve www.devonlive.com

Empty second homes where owners are miles away and unreachable may cause delays to gas supplies being restored.

As thousands of homes across the south Devon area continue to struggle without gas, just as the mercury drops thanks to a cold weather front, teams of workers are having to go building to building to ensure the supply can be safely switched back on.

Since January 3, when a gas main was damaged by what Wales and West Utilities called a “third party” in a field at Belle Hill, near Kingsbridge, engineers have worked around the clock to try and get supplies back to homes.

The firm said that by the evening of January 4, engineers had already visited 90 per cent of the properties affected.

The company explained that although the main repair was now finished, the process of safely restoring gas to individual properties was still ongoing.

It added that workers must visit every property twice – once to turn the gas supply off and then, when the network is ready, a second time to turn it back on and relight appliances.

However, thanks to an increase in holiday homes and second homes in parts of South Devon, this means that there is no immediate access to some residential properties.

A spokesperson for Wales and West Utilities explained today [January 5] that places like Salcombe – which, according to parish records, has 574 second homes and 299 holiday lets, 45.3 per cent of the total dwellings in the parish – the owners are not present.

They said the firm had put out a plea to local letting agencies, estate agents, and keyholders to get in touch with the firm “so that we can arrange access to any properties that they may be responsible for.”

The spokesperson said they had had a “really good response to that, so we’d have to thank people who’ve responded – but obviously it’s still important that we get to visit these properties as well as part of restoring a supply.

“What it means, we need to keep sending engineers back to these properties to try and gain the access so that we can isolate the supply.

“So that means they’re not able to be focussing on restoring supplies to other customers.

“It just delays us getting the kind of number of properties that we need isolated before we can commence the safe restoration of the properties.”

In a later update on Monday evening, a spokesperson added: “Since early this morning, our teams have been working tirelessly to restore supplies to customers impacted by the third-party damage caused to our gas main near Kingsbridge.

“We have over 100 engineers – many drafted in from elsewhere across our network – working across the areas to restore supplies as quickly as possible.

“This afternoon, we completed the restoration of supplies in Malborough. The only properties remaining are those where there has been nobody at the property when we have called. We have tried these properties on a number of occasions and have left a card with information on how to contact us. We will arrange for an engineer to call to restore the supply to those individual properties as soon as contact is made with us.

“We have also made good progress in Kingsbridge today. Our engineers have been working their way around the properties there, and they will continue to work late into this evening restoring supplies, before continuing again first thing tomorrow morning.

“In Salcombe, thanks to the positive response we have had today to our plea to access the empty properties there, we are now in a position to be able to begin commissioning the gas network. Firstly, we will need to monitor ‘no access’ properties to ensure that there are no gas escape traces within these properties. Once we are satisfied that there are no escapes, we will then be able to commence the process of restoring supplies.

“We continue to appreciate everyone’s patience as we work to restore supplies and value people’s continued support in enabling us to gain access to their properties.”

There seems to be a bit of foot dragging in Exeter about committing to May elections.

As Owl has already pointed out, on the basis of the County elections, Labour is set to lose any council representation outside the Plymouth enclave. In other words, it will lose control of Exeter City in the government’s proposed reorganisation even if it gets its way in absorbing some of the surrounding districts into an “Exeter based unitary authority”.

In these circumstances, one could question whether Exeter has any substantive mandate to pursue such a notion in the first place.

The press article below has some interesting quotes from County Councillors on the proposed reorganisation.

Owl’s personal view is that the proposed timescales are totally unrealistic especially given the wide divergence of view about how Devon should be carved up, the need to find suitable offices, etc. [Unless the government goes “full Surrey” and simply divides Devon north/south into just two unitary authorities with Plymouth in the western half and Exeter in the eastern half. The two cities would then be obvious site for the councils.]

Pressure mounts on Exeter ahead of  crunch election debate

Bradley Gerrard, Local Democracy Reporter www.devonairradio.com

Pressure is mounting on Exeter ahead of a deadline linked to whether the city will seek to postpone its elections.

A crunch meeting is scheduled to take place on Friday just over a mile from the city council’s headquarters about the issue, and opposition politicians have submitted a motion urging them to go ahead.

A special meeting has been called by Devon County Council, which wants all its 60 councillors to form a view about the prospect of Exeter City Council postponing elections in the city.

And Councillor Diane Moore (Green Party, St David’s), a member of Exeter City Council, has submitted a motion urging the council to honour the scheduled elections in May.

Local government minister Alison McGovern wrote to 64 councils in December stating that Westminster had been contacted by several councils that had raised concerns about their ability to run elections amid the ongoing process of local government reorganisation.

That process will see two-tier areas, such as Devon, where both county councils and district councils operate in the same geographic area, changed to unitary councils that will oversee all services in their areas.

Elections for the new unitary councils when they are formed are pencilled in for 2027, and are expected to begin operating in 2028.

“I’m pretty sure there will be cross-party condemnation [by Devon County Council councillors] of the government for meddling with democracy, which is dangerous,” Councillor Julian Brazil (Liberal Democrat, Kingsbridge), the leader of the county council, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Cllr Moore sent a notice of motion today (Monday 5 January) in a bid to discuss the issue at Exeter City Council’s full council meeting next week.

It calls on the city council to “resolve to inform government that elections will take place as scheduled for Exeter City Council on 7 May 2026”.

“As the leader has been silent on the issue, I think it’s time councillors discussed it,” Cllr Moore added.

After Devon County Council’s meeting on Friday, it’s likely Cllr Brazil will write to the government to express that council’s view.

Cllr Brazil added that Friday’s meeting at County Hall could also be a platform for the wider issues of local government reorganisation, and devolution, the process through which areas are supposed to secure directly elected mayors.

“The government promised devolution in its manifesto, and not local government reorganisation, but we’re getting the latter and not the former,” Cllr Brazil added.

“Is it a coincidence that the mayoral set-up costs government money and the local government reorganisation doesn’t but does cost councils money? I don’t think so and I believe that’s why reorganisation is going ahead.”

Some areas, such as Surrey, have been told how their councils should be reorganised yet have not been informed about the prospects for directly elected mayors yet, which is something they were expecting.

In terms of scheduled elections this year, councils have complained that the process of developing reorganisation proposals has been extremely resource intensive, and that holding elections in May – just before they could be told how they have to reorganise themselves – could be problematic.

“Now that we have received all proposals, it is only right that we listen to councils who are expressing concerns about their capacity to deliver a smooth and safe transition to new councils, alongside running resource-intensive elections to councils who may be shortly abolished,” Ms McGovern’s letter said.

“We have also received representations from councils concerned about the cost to taxpayers of holding elections to councils that are proposed to shortly be abolished.

“Previous governments have postponed local elections in areas contemplating and undergoing local government reorganisation to allow councils to focus their time and energy on the process. We have now received requests from multiple councils to postpone their local elections in May 2026.”

Ms McGovern said the government “will listen” to representations from council leaders who believe postponing their local elections makes sense.

Both Plymouth City Council and Exeter City Council have scheduled elections in May 2026, and while Plymouth was quick to confirm their poll would go-ahead, there has been no formal confirmation either way from Exeter.

Cllr Brazil has criticised the notion of councils being allowed to postpone elections, and was opposed to the prospect at the county council when the former Conservative administration requested the postponement of the 2025 local elections. That request was not accepted by the government.

Exeter City Council has a full council meeting on Tuesday 13 January – just two days before it has to formally tell the government whether it wishes to postpone its elections or not.

The agenda for that meeting has not yet been published, so it is not clear whether the city council will dedicate time in that meeting to the issue of postponing the elections, although Cllr Moore’s motion is likely to force the issue onto the agenda.

Last week, a spokesperson for the city council said nothing had yet been decided about the May 2026 polls.
 

The government plans to abolish Crime and Police Commissioners when their current terms end in May 2028.

Our selfie girl says:

 “I have decided to step away from party politics and become an Independent.

“I believe it will enable me to fight to secure the policing resources we have in Devon and Cornwall – 43 per cent of which is funded by all of us through our council tax.

Why now? Has she something else in mind? – Owl

The PCC for Devon and Cornwall to serve as Independent

Bobby Angelov www.exmouthjournal.co.uk

The Devon and Cornwall Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) has announced that she is stepping down from the Conservative Party.

Alison Hernandez, who represents Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, will now serve the remainder of her term as an Independent, citing concerns about national changes to policing oversight and a desire to act without political influence.

Ms Hernandez, who is currently serving her third term after first being elected in 2016, said: “I have decided to step away from party politics and become an Independent.

“I believe it will enable me to fight to secure the policing resources we have in Devon and Cornwall – 43 per cent of which is funded by all of us through our council tax.

“The imminent Government white paper on policing worries me.

“Rushed timescales, work done in secret with little consultation, this feels like something being done to the police and the people, not being done with or for us.

“And the timing of the abolition of PCCs, again not planned, makes me anxious for our area.

“We cannot afford for party politics to get in the way of ensuring we all work together to get the best deal for the people of Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.”

The change comes amid major national reforms.

In November 2025, the Government announced the planned abolition of Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) when their current terms end in May 2028.

Additional policing reforms are expected to be outlined in a forthcoming Government white paper.

Ms Hernandez has assured officers, staff, volunteers, and the public that the priorities set out in the current Police and Crime Plan will remain in place, and that her focus remains on representing the needs of the force area.

Her office is supported by a non-political team led by a Chief Executive, who will continue to carry out their statutory duties and hold the police service to account throughout her term.

Further information on the Government’s plans for the future of police governance is expected in the upcoming white paper.