Helen Pender
Asks:
Why is our money going to prop up Brent Council?
HELEN PENDER – Independent candidate - Oakham North East Ward.
I’m asking you to help me change the face of local politics on May 5th in order to deliver a more transparent, more accountable, local democracy.
A MORE TRANSPARENT DEMOCRACY
For example, I would like to know how our council justifies giving a two million pound, soft terms loan to Brent Council? Was half a percent (0.5%) really the best interest rate that Rutland County council were able to obtain? Or are the people of Rutland being asked to fork out for overspending in Brent?
We have had various differing reports on what has happened to the money lost in the Icelandic banking fiasco and none of the explanations has been consistent. First we were told that we were going to get all the money back (about a million pounds) – then we were told that we had got all the money back – then we were told that most of the money had been returned – then we were told that we’d recovered just over 50%, but that further instalments were expected. I am not even sure that the members of Rutland County Council (DC), whether Councillors or Officers, know what the real position is – particularly after the local paper reported that our council “found” £1 million recently. No one knows where it was hidden or how it was ‘found.’
To ensure that the money we lost in the Iceland banking fiasco is not repeated we need to be told the thinking behind our investment policies.
This is your money that “they” are misusing and you should be told why approximately 7.5% of our annual budget has gone to Brent Council; when we can expect to see the money returned and why such a small interest rate was fixed.
Had Brent Council gone to a bank for this loan they could have expected to pay at least 6% interest to a bank. Why does Rutland County Council believe that they should use our money to help out a London Council? What on earth induced RCC to make this sort of ‘investment’? Who knows? I don’t. But we should be told. I intend to ask these sorts of questions.
SUPPORTING SAINSBURY'S
The decision to turn down Sainsbury’s is an economic disaster for Oakham. Tesco needs real competition. Some of their pricing reflects the virtual monopoly Tesco has in the area. By denying Sainsbury’s permission to build at the end of Land’s End Way we have given up 300 jobs (equivalent to 200 full time jobs) and a real competitor to help keep down food prices for supermarket shoppers. One of the arguments was that the land Sainsbury’s intended to build on had been set aside for office use – since around 2001. The fact remains that no one has wanted to build offices on this site for ten years and no one else looks likely to want to build on the site.
Nothing has been built on the Sainsbury’s site and so no jobs are being created.
We are gong to be entering an era of severe local economic recession due to the closure of RAF Cottesmore and HMP Ashwell with the loss of hundreds of jobs and the consequent loss of hundreds of people able to pay Council tax. One of the reasons we haven’t attracted sufficient B1 office use on the site, on which Sainsbury’s wish to build, is due to the fact that offices built on that site will have nowhere for office workers to buy sandwiches, petrol, and essential stationery. A supermarket on the site will ensure that it becomes attractive to would be builders of offices.
(See www.helenpender.blogspot.com posting on Sainsbury’s planning fiasco for a more in depth analysis.) Oakham needs to be rescued from the short term thinking which has dogged this Council. I am not connected either financially or in any other way to Sainsbury but will campaign for Sainsbury’s planning application to be accepted and will support any appeal they may make.
PUBLIC TRANSPORT
The Government has offered substantial economic inducements to build new housing. The RCC new housing initiatives on the Hawkesmead Estate and elsewhere will net the Council well over £500,000 in subsidies from Central Government. However there is a real problem for people who do not drive. Our public transport system is in a dire state. Without a car, residents cannot work on Sundays in either Stamford or Melton (since we have no buses at all on a Sunday and no trains run until the afternoon); mid-week the last bus to leave Peterborough for Oakham is at 4.40 pm. Residents can’t even go to a nightclub, see a film or the theatre in Stamford or Melton, since our public transport system makes it impossible to return on the evening of the performance. Residents unable to drive cannot work or play outside Oakham.
Many households cannot afford to run more than one vehicle and others, especially pensioners and young people, do not have access to motor vehicles. This limits their mobility, both for leisure and for work.
Oakham’s economic future depends upon having a decent public transport system which will be the key to future growth in an increasingly difficult local economy. Employers like RAF Cottesmore and HMP Ashwell have left and we desperately need to attract new businesses to the area. Without public transport we are rudderless and hopelessly adrift in these difficult economic times.
FINALLY
I intend to really listen to electors. The fact that almost everyone I have spoken to in Oakham has supported Sainsbury’s planning application is a proof of the sad reality that local Councillors neither listen to their constituents nor vote in their interests.
Can you help to change the face of local policies in our local Council? - Yes you can.
Printed and published for Helen Pender care of Finkey Street, Oakham, Rutland LE156AG telephone: 07749571341
Showing posts with label Sainsburys. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sainsburys. Show all posts
Monday, 4 April 2011
Friday, 25 February 2011
Rutland County Council Development and Control Licensing Committee Meeting Tuesday 22 February 2011.
Also Known As: The Sainsbury’s planning application fiasco.
There were three public deputations: Mr Fletton spoke in favour of the officers’ recommendation for refusal of the planning permission for a Sainsbury’s Supermarket to be built at the end of Land’s End Way. Why?
Well this was the elephant in the room. Put at its most simply, if I am right, Waitrose has promised to buy a site on the old Rutland College site when they move to Barleythorpe. Waitrose promise to pay top dollar and the monies will go to RCC, who have to stump up for converting Barleythorpe to a New Further Education College. But no one mentioned this all evening. The clue lay in the fact that Mr Fletton is head of Rutland / Tresham College in Oakham.
BUT – Waitrose have said that if planning permission is given to Sainsbury’s then they will not be interested in pursuing their proposed development on the old Rutland College site. So it seems - no Waitrose, no money for a new College. Ergo Sainsbury’s planning application had to be defeated.
However those are not legal or sufficient grounds for denying planning permission to Sainsbury’s. So instead we were subjected to arguments, from the planning officers of RCC about:
1. Loss of employment land. (Three hundred jobs are to be created)
2. The site is more suitable for B1 Office Development. (This site has been available for B1 Office use since 2001 and remains unused. Why? Because no one wants to build offices in the middle of nowhere if staff can’t even get a sandwich during their lunch break and have to negotiate an increasingly busy level crossing to get into the centre of town during a half hour lunch break – an impossibility.)
3. The employment of a foodstore is not as significant as would be created by the uses specified in the Local Plan. [B1 - Office use] (This is pie in the sky. This land has been available since 2001 and no offices have been built on the site. Undeveloped office land creates a 0% increase in employment. In fact the proposed store just uses up 8% of the whole area set aside for B1 Office Development. It would seem with the closure of Cottesmore and HMP Ashwell we are about to hit an economic slump of monstrous proportions. No company has been induced to build any offices on this site for over ten years. The logic of the officers’ arguments appears to be: ‘We want office jobs in the area, but since we can’t get offices into the area we won’t let anyone create retail jobs either.’ The people of Oakham desperately need bread today and the officers appear to be arguing in favour of a fantastical jam tomorrow project in the teeth of economic reality. I would argue that a Sainsbury supermarket is more likely to attract B1 Offices to the site. An employer is not going to believe it an attractive office site if there are no local amenities for staff to purchase emergency office supplies, petrol and sandwiches.)
4. Refusal is consistent with adopted Local Plan Policy and with Government Guidance in Planning Police Statement 4 [PPS4]. (There is some flexibility in that Planning Policy Statement 4 and anyway the PPS4 is ‘Guidance.’ A persuasive argument can me made that allowing a Sainsbury supermarket on the site will attract B1 office use in the longer term.)
5. The need for a foodstore of the scale proposed is marginal. (So let such a store be put on the margins of the town and attract visitors from rural destinations around the by-pass without clogging up the town centre. Conversely with the housing development at Hawkesmeade the site will no longer be so marginal).
6. PPS4 encourages main town centre uses in central locations. (Well why didn’t they say so earlier? Let’s just demolish the Castle and let Sainsbury’s build there. Or perhaps compulsorily purchase the land between Mill Street and the RCC, demolish the Museum and build a Sainsbury’s there. Surely huge great eyesores like Tesco. Waitrose, Sainsbury, Asda, Lidl, etc are better not polluting the aesthetic beauty of our town centres. No – it would seem that the planning officers have identified two alternate sites in the town – one on the Tim Norton site at the railway crossing and another, neither of which would seem to provide enough space in which to shoehorn a supermarket with petrol station. Anyway Land’s End Way is on a bus route and when the Hawkesmead estate opens, with small retail outlets in an edge of town development, the proposed Sainsbury site will no longer be so much ‘out of town’ as ‘edge of town.’ Quite the best place for an eyesore. Furthermore Waitrose proposes to build at the other end of Land’s End Way, not much nearer to the town centre, and you can bet your bottom dollar that planning permission will be recommended by the officers. I wonder why?)
7. A Sequential Assessment is required with any main town centre use proposed for a non-central location – i.e. are there more central sites that would be appropriate? (Already covered in 6 above – this argument was considered by the officers to be their clincher in turning down this planning application and much was made of it. It is merely a red herring, who wants to destroy our town centre with an eyesore? The architectural value of supermarkets is worse than a ‘carbuncle on the face of a very old friend.’ Supermarket architecture has all the charm of a Soviet bunker – except that Soviet bunkers are hidden below ground.
8. Refusal is in accordance with government guidance. (BUNKUM – it’s in accordance with the fact that Waitrose will get permission to build on the same road for some very short term financial considerations regarding a Further Education College’s relocation to Barleythorpe.)
The fact that Cllr Terry King, who pretends to sit on the fence, could be seen jubilating with Helen Briggs, the Chief Executive, after the meeting gave us a clue as to the real reasons behind this refusal. It’s time we asked the full Council to consider this planning application and only YOU the public can do that by popular demand. Write individually to each and every Councillor to demand that this application goes to the full Council. With luck that will happen after May and, with a following wind, all the Tory councillors, whipped in to vote against Sainsbury’s planning application, will have lost their seats. Only your letters and your votes can make a change in Rutland.
The meeting on 22 February was a disingenuous fiasco. The Rutland barn is full of foul smelling excrement. Let’s stop calling a spade ‘an excavating implement’ and let’s shovel this lot of ne’er do wells out of office, together with their jobsworth planning officers.
1,152
There were three public deputations: Mr Fletton spoke in favour of the officers’ recommendation for refusal of the planning permission for a Sainsbury’s Supermarket to be built at the end of Land’s End Way. Why?
Well this was the elephant in the room. Put at its most simply, if I am right, Waitrose has promised to buy a site on the old Rutland College site when they move to Barleythorpe. Waitrose promise to pay top dollar and the monies will go to RCC, who have to stump up for converting Barleythorpe to a New Further Education College. But no one mentioned this all evening. The clue lay in the fact that Mr Fletton is head of Rutland / Tresham College in Oakham.
BUT – Waitrose have said that if planning permission is given to Sainsbury’s then they will not be interested in pursuing their proposed development on the old Rutland College site. So it seems - no Waitrose, no money for a new College. Ergo Sainsbury’s planning application had to be defeated.
However those are not legal or sufficient grounds for denying planning permission to Sainsbury’s. So instead we were subjected to arguments, from the planning officers of RCC about:
1. Loss of employment land. (Three hundred jobs are to be created)
2. The site is more suitable for B1 Office Development. (This site has been available for B1 Office use since 2001 and remains unused. Why? Because no one wants to build offices in the middle of nowhere if staff can’t even get a sandwich during their lunch break and have to negotiate an increasingly busy level crossing to get into the centre of town during a half hour lunch break – an impossibility.)
3. The employment of a foodstore is not as significant as would be created by the uses specified in the Local Plan. [B1 - Office use] (This is pie in the sky. This land has been available since 2001 and no offices have been built on the site. Undeveloped office land creates a 0% increase in employment. In fact the proposed store just uses up 8% of the whole area set aside for B1 Office Development. It would seem with the closure of Cottesmore and HMP Ashwell we are about to hit an economic slump of monstrous proportions. No company has been induced to build any offices on this site for over ten years. The logic of the officers’ arguments appears to be: ‘We want office jobs in the area, but since we can’t get offices into the area we won’t let anyone create retail jobs either.’ The people of Oakham desperately need bread today and the officers appear to be arguing in favour of a fantastical jam tomorrow project in the teeth of economic reality. I would argue that a Sainsbury supermarket is more likely to attract B1 Offices to the site. An employer is not going to believe it an attractive office site if there are no local amenities for staff to purchase emergency office supplies, petrol and sandwiches.)
4. Refusal is consistent with adopted Local Plan Policy and with Government Guidance in Planning Police Statement 4 [PPS4]. (There is some flexibility in that Planning Policy Statement 4 and anyway the PPS4 is ‘Guidance.’ A persuasive argument can me made that allowing a Sainsbury supermarket on the site will attract B1 office use in the longer term.)
5. The need for a foodstore of the scale proposed is marginal. (So let such a store be put on the margins of the town and attract visitors from rural destinations around the by-pass without clogging up the town centre. Conversely with the housing development at Hawkesmeade the site will no longer be so marginal).
6. PPS4 encourages main town centre uses in central locations. (Well why didn’t they say so earlier? Let’s just demolish the Castle and let Sainsbury’s build there. Or perhaps compulsorily purchase the land between Mill Street and the RCC, demolish the Museum and build a Sainsbury’s there. Surely huge great eyesores like Tesco. Waitrose, Sainsbury, Asda, Lidl, etc are better not polluting the aesthetic beauty of our town centres. No – it would seem that the planning officers have identified two alternate sites in the town – one on the Tim Norton site at the railway crossing and another, neither of which would seem to provide enough space in which to shoehorn a supermarket with petrol station. Anyway Land’s End Way is on a bus route and when the Hawkesmead estate opens, with small retail outlets in an edge of town development, the proposed Sainsbury site will no longer be so much ‘out of town’ as ‘edge of town.’ Quite the best place for an eyesore. Furthermore Waitrose proposes to build at the other end of Land’s End Way, not much nearer to the town centre, and you can bet your bottom dollar that planning permission will be recommended by the officers. I wonder why?)
7. A Sequential Assessment is required with any main town centre use proposed for a non-central location – i.e. are there more central sites that would be appropriate? (Already covered in 6 above – this argument was considered by the officers to be their clincher in turning down this planning application and much was made of it. It is merely a red herring, who wants to destroy our town centre with an eyesore? The architectural value of supermarkets is worse than a ‘carbuncle on the face of a very old friend.’ Supermarket architecture has all the charm of a Soviet bunker – except that Soviet bunkers are hidden below ground.
8. Refusal is in accordance with government guidance. (BUNKUM – it’s in accordance with the fact that Waitrose will get permission to build on the same road for some very short term financial considerations regarding a Further Education College’s relocation to Barleythorpe.)
The fact that Cllr Terry King, who pretends to sit on the fence, could be seen jubilating with Helen Briggs, the Chief Executive, after the meeting gave us a clue as to the real reasons behind this refusal. It’s time we asked the full Council to consider this planning application and only YOU the public can do that by popular demand. Write individually to each and every Councillor to demand that this application goes to the full Council. With luck that will happen after May and, with a following wind, all the Tory councillors, whipped in to vote against Sainsbury’s planning application, will have lost their seats. Only your letters and your votes can make a change in Rutland.
The meeting on 22 February was a disingenuous fiasco. The Rutland barn is full of foul smelling excrement. Let’s stop calling a spade ‘an excavating implement’ and let’s shovel this lot of ne’er do wells out of office, together with their jobsworth planning officers.
1,152
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