Local Councillor's Concerns About Democratic Accountability of Vision Board Continue...

Preston Riversway Councillor, Jack Davenport, has raised further concerns about the recent proposals to restructure Preston Vision Board, claiming the reorganisation 'will do little to encourage the idea that there will be more democratic involvement'.


You can click on the letter to enlarge it...

In his letter, sent to the Lancashire Evening Post this week, Jack Davenport sets out his concerns that:

'The proposals outlined seem to make a move towards greater private sector control, with the council being reduced to a mere consultative role. They will weaken the already poor "partnership" and undermine the public's faith in democratic representation'.

Further, Councillor Davenport is concerned that 'developments in Preston' should be 'guided by public, not private sector need', arguing that 'Only the council, as a democratically representative body, has the authority to make that judgment', and pointing out that this authority is granted 'not by private business or interest, but by the people of this city'.

Councillor Davenport concludes his letter by arguing that 'Reorganisation of the Vision Board should involve major reform, accountability and control so that if the council says "jump", the Vision Board asks "how high?".'


We wholeheartedly share Jack Davenport's concerns on this issue, particularly in view of the Chairman of the Vision Board Malcolm McVicar's comments made last week in response to the proposed reorganisation of the Vision Board to include the Leaders of Preston and South Ribble councils that:

"Having council leaders on board is a good thing" but "It's my responsibility as chairman to make sure it doesn't slow the process" !!!


Whilst we agree with the moves to make Preston Vision Board more democratically accountable, which were kick-started by Councillor Bhikhu Patel earlier this summer, the concerns raised by Jack Davenport are only half the story:

Local residents are equally concerned about the Vision currently being pursued by Preston City Council itself, as there appears to be equal enthusiasm for the Ribble barrage and the Penwortham green belt/floodplain development proposals amongst the ruling majority on Preston City Council as there is on the Vision Board.

As part of this, local residents and a number of Councillors are deeply concerned about Preston Council's recent vote to remove decisions regarding large funding bids - such as for Riverworks - from the full scrutiny and democratic accountability of full council chamber and into a select City Centre Committee.

As such, questions of democratic accountability extend far beyond the Vision Board and into the Council itself.

So far we have seen no serious consultation of local people undertaken by this council regarding the Riverworks Barrage and floodplain development proposals.

When representatives from Save The Ribble Campaign finally managed to meet with Chief Executive Jim Carr and the officer with responsibility for the Riverworks scheme, Mike Brogan, this summer:

- We were assured that we would be consulted about the brief for the consultancy of the feasibility study funding bid the council are planning to submit to the North West Development Agency this financial year - BUT WE WERE NOT ASSURED THAT LOCAL PEOPLE WOULD BE CONSULTED ABOUT WHETHER THE BID WOULD GO AHEAD IN THE FIRST PLACE - DESPITE THE OVERWHELMING EVIDENCE THAT LOCAL PEOPLE DON'T WANT THE BARRAGE!

- We had an interesting discussion about the many alternative ideas which local people have had to make the most of our river and green spaces without damaging these vital local assets, but THE COUNCIL DIRECTLY REFUSED TO CONSIDER PURSUING THESE ALTERNATIVE PROPOSALS INSTEAD - although they are quite happy to use these ideas 'as a contributor to help shape future development options' - in other words, use them to "green-up" the barrage and housing development proposals;

- No opportunity was given at the meeting to discuss the real concerns of local people and numerous environmental organisations about the environmental impacts of the barrage and floodplain development schemes, but we were assured that "THE COUNCIL WOULD NOT WISH TO PROCEED BEYOND THE STUDY IF THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT WAS AS IRRETRIEVABLY ADVERSE AS SOME ARE PREDICTING"!!!

If the council are prepared to accept environmental impact up to the point of irretrievable damage, then they are clearly more than happy to accept a huge amount of damage, pushing the Ribble's entire ecosystem almost to the point of irretrievable collapse!


On a related note, we see with interest the Lancashire Evening Post's report that a number of prominent Preston Council officers are leaving for pastures new, and the Chief Executive of the council, Jim Carr, has claimed that some may not be replaced...

One of the leaving party is Nicola Turner, who fronts the Preston City Vision and represents both Preston City Council and the Vision Board on the Riverworks project, so we wonder whether her vacant post will be filled...?

Whilst we wave goodbye to Nicola as she heads off to Stockport to become project director for the town centre "masterplan" - which has '£500 million redevelopment of the city centre' planned 'in a deal with Australian development firm Lend Lease' (LEP 18.9.07), we are left with our own experience of Nicola Turner that she was at least prepared to come to Broadgate and give a presentation to local people about the Ribble Barrage and floodplain Housing ideas contained in the Riverworks Proposals, while those men who were responsible for coming up with these ideas in the first place were content to stay hidden away at the Town Hall, leaving her to face the public's anger on her own...

Mind you, she was also unable to answer the many important questions local people asked her, so the glossy and wholly one-sided presentation was rather limited in terms of real information.

We watch and wait...

You can contact us at savetheribble@tiscali.co.uk

A BARRAGE TO DEMOCRACY

Elaine Abbott’s revealing account of the development of the Tithebarn Project (LEP 5/7/07) provides a timely warning of how the democratic process is threatened when Councils tie themselves into agreements with big business.

Elaine’s account shows how Preston City Council’s pursuit of the Tithebarn project resulted in the interests and wishes of local people being subverted in favour of the mantra of economic regeneration and the interests of Grosvenor Estates.

Her account makes alarming reading for the 74% of local people who are opposed to the plans to build a barrage on the Ribble, since it reveals remarkable similarities between the early stages of the Tithebarn development and the current Riverworks project.

Elaine writes that the Tithebarn Regeneration Project was fraught with problems because it was obvious from the beginning that:

“Grosvenor Estates were determined that it would be done their way or not at all…..In the early days as a then Labour Councillor, I sat on the town centre management committee. The meetings were shrouded in secrecy. It was a very small committee with very few councillors who were outnumbered by Town Hall Officers and the Duke of Westminster’s [Grosvenor Estates] representatives”.

Whilst members of the committee were threatened with legal proceedings if they discussed the smallest detail outside the committee room, other councillors were angry that, although the Tithebarn project would have an enormous impact on the people of Preston, they were neither allowed to sit in as observers nor see the minutes of the meeting.

Today we have a situation where Preston City Council policy in respect of Riverworks is being driven by Council officers and the un-elected Preston Vision Board - despite opposition from local councillors and the vast majority of local people. Much of the decision making around Riverworks is taking place behind closed doors whilst minutes and business plans – including a recent report completed by the property consultants King Sturges - remain secret from members of the public.

It is clear that, as was the case with the Tithebarn project, the potential of vast financial investments could once again result in the interests of the people of Preston - and our unique River environment - taking second place to those of big business.

According to another article in the Lancashire Evening Post - in which they examine some aspects of the recent barrage funding controversy - some councillors are already indicating that our environment might have to be sacrificed to attract the reported £800 million pounds investment that Riverworks may bring.

Councillor Cartwright, a cabinet member for the environment on Preston City Council “claims his passion to protect the Ribble estuary will be balanced against the millions of pounds which can be pumped into the river (sic) through the….. Riverworks project” (LEP 6/7/07).
We might add that building a barrage on the Ribble would indeed be just as much a waste of public money as pumping millions of pounds into the River and letting it float out to the Irish Sea...

Elaine Abbotts account suggests that decision making around the Tithebarn project became concentrated in the hands of a small and secretive committee.

This echoes the report last week that Preston City Council voted, by a narrow margin (the poll was tied 27-27 and relied on the casting vote of the mayor), to transfer decision making for large projects from full council scrutiny to a select City Centre Committee.
This Committee will have the power to spend £12.9 million of North West Development Agency (NWDA) cash. Previously, any plan which cost more than £250,000 had to be referred to full Council, but this will no longer be the case.

According to Councillor Jack Davenport this means that:

"in the future most Councillors will not be able to get a say in large scale projects (for example, the feasibility study for the Barrage). This removes the bulk of democratic opposition (or support) to any project and renders voter representation virtually mute on the subject.”

Given the widespread public opposition to proposals for a Ribble barrage this concentration of decision making into one committee will, according to Councillor Davenport, make the barrage “far more likely” (LEP 6/7/07).

Preston City Council still insist that Riverworks and the barrage scheme are ideas only and will be subject to full feasibility studies. Yet Save the Ribble and other environmental organisations have already provided enough evidence to suggest that building a barrage would have disastrous consequences for our environment and, along with its associated floodplain building development, would also increase the risk of local flooding
- a fact which even Preston City Council leader Councillor Hudson appears to acknowledge, agreeing that the serious flooding scenes of recent weeks 'would prompt a rethink on the plans' to build houses on the floodplain "If the Environment Agency are saying there should be no houses on flood plain land at Preston" (LEP 30/6/07) - at a time when the Environment Agency are already saying there should be no further building developments on floodplains AT ALL.

So why carry on wasting public money in its pursuit?

The concern of local residents has always been that Preston City Council is becoming tied into agreements with developers and big business that will drive Riverworks and give the barrage project an unstoppable momemtum. Once again there are parallels with the Tithebarn development.

As Elaine Abbott reports:

“the threat that Grosvenor would take their millions elsewhere was enough to send the Town Hall into a flap. The biggest issue of all was the bus station. Some of us, knowing that most people in Preston would not want to see it moved, suggested that it could be modernized (but) there was to be no debate. Anyone who queried this was accused of being a dinosaur and of trying to prevent Preston moving into the 21st century.”

As part of their feasibility study for Riverworks, Preston City Council has promised that there will be widespread public consultation. But if widespread public opposition to a barrage threatens the potential millions of £s investment, will Preston City Council be thrown into another flap which will lead them to override the wishes of local people and the protection of our environment?

Once again Elaine Abbott’s account of the Tithebarn project sounds a warning:

“I (was) not the only one to be frustrated during the past few years to hear that the public were to be consulted about the bus station. It gave the impression that the most popular vote to keep it in its present location would be given serious consideration. That would never happen. The Tithebarn progamme was never intended to include public consultation.”

The LEP reports that Councillor Neil Cartwright, who says that he has not made his mind up about the Riverworks proposals, has called for an informed debate and believes the debate has been hijacked by people opposed to a single part of Riverworks – the barrage.
He says that other ideas include improving the docks area and linking the canal to the dock basin: “the problem is that people have come to the conclusion that Riverworks is just about the barrage and formed their opinion on that alone” (LEP 6/7/07).

In fact Save the Ribble campaign has never opposed the ideas for improving the dock or reinstating the canal in Preston. And neither is Save the Ribble Campaign opposed to investment and economic development. But we do argue that any development has to be environmentally and economically sustainable and should enhance rather than diminish our natural environment!

Unfortunately, it is difficult to have an informed debate about these issues when Preston City Council have now voted to remove the decision making process from the scrutiny of most councillors aswell as local people.

Preston City Council and the Vision Board have placed the Ribble barrage and the associated development on our green belt as the 'key project proposals' of their Preston Economic Regeneration Strategy and Prioritised Action Plan, to the exclusion of other more sustainable and less environmentally damaging alternatives. The Council appears to have already decided that Riverworks is the only way forward for Preston.

Councillor Ron Atkins has questioned why the Council’s Chief Executive supports the barrage project before the outcome of a feasibility study is known - a study which the Council is spending hundreds of thousands of pounds of tax-payer's money on.
Councillor Atkins writes (LEP letters 28/6/07):

“It seems to me that attempts are being made to present the project to residents for consultation as a fait accompli although it originated only as a “Vision” of a group of people with special interests, who are as unrepresentative of the residents as they are of the councillors whom the residents elected”.

By what right do these special interests groups suppose that they can pursue their “Vision” at the expense of the wishes of local people and our environment?

In pursuit of the Riverworks project Preston City Council will have to attract vast amounts of private investment – possibly another Grosvenor Estates – whose only interest will be making huge profits.

The question is will Preston City Council be prepared to listen to informed debate and the wishes of the people if in so doing they risk losing millions of £s investment in the City?

And how will local people – and their elected representatives at the Town Hall – know what decisions are being taken behind the closed doors of the City Centre Committee?

You can contact us at savetheribble@tiscali.co.uk

A Barrage of Democracy?

In a week when Gordon Brown, the new PM, declares his determination to re-democratise politics and restore the trust of the people in our elected political representatives...
in a week when 74% of residents vote NO to a Ribble Barrage...
PRESTON CITY COUNCIL HAVE VOTED TO REMOVE THE DECISION-MAKING PROCESS REGARDING THE RIBBLE BARRAGE OUT OF THE DEMOCRATIC FRAMEWORK OF THE COUNCIL CHAMBER.

Councillor Jack Davenport, Riversway Ward, sent in a comment to our previous article on the overwhelmingly anti-barrage LEP vote to say that in the Council meeting last Thursday (28th June):

"both the Tories and Lib Dems backed and passed proposals to move the power and decision making over large grants from the Council to the City Centre Committee. This effectively means that in the future most Councillors will not be able to get a say in large scale projects (for example, the feasibility study for the Barrage). This removes the bulk of democratic opposition (or support) to any project and renders voter representation virtually mute on the subject. The report presented to Council mentioned the Vision Board frequently and it looks increasingly likely that the Committee will become a rubber stamping body for whatever the Vision Board wants to do or recommends."

Save The Ribble Campaign are not politically partisan as we are local residents who come from all walks of life and are of all - and no - political persuasion, and we receive support from Councillors in Preston and South Ribble from all political parties. Only today, the Lancashire Evening Post reports that whilst Ribchester suffers serious flooding, Tory shadow environment secretary Peter Ainsworth is raising concerns in Parliament about proposals to built thousands of new homes near rivers vulnerable to flooding.

Nonetheless, Preston Council chambers appears to be politically-divided, with the ruling Tory and Lib Dem group determined to remove the decisions regarding the Riverworks Barrage from the Democratic process.
This is an infringement of their democratic mandate, which is to represent the interests of the people who voted for them - 74% of whom have made it clear they do NOT want the Ribble Barrage.

This is an infringement of democracy and accountability. The pro-barrage lobby will use this to push the barrage proposal through behind closed doors and effectively ignore the wishes of local people as well as the environmental and economic consequences to the River Ribble and our local communities. Ignoring what local people and environmental organisations - such as the Environment Agency - say seems to be becoming something of a habit... As Peter Ainsworth says, "At present, a quarter of all planning applications opposed by the Environment Agency still go ahead"...

What is YOUR Councillor saying about this issue?

Does YOUR Councillor support this undemocratic decision?

Does YOUR Councillor represent YOUR interests?

Email us at savetheribble@tiscali.co.uk

Read more about the PRESTON CITY VISION BOARD'S FUNDING here

Lunch Is On Us

Preston Vision Board, is already being dubbed by some as "Preston's real government", because it is making key decisions that will affect the future of all Preston's people. Yet the group is unelected and represents property developers such as Grosvenor Estates, and other businesses involved in the construction industry. This is the group which first came up with the notion of barraging the Ribble, and building over 4000 houses in it's floodplain.

The group is only now beginning to release minutes of it's meetings, going right back to it's first meetings in 2003.

We at Save The Ribble have got a copy of the minutes of their meeting held on 20th December 2006, courtesy of a Labour councillor who is angry at the Vision Board's record of failing to inform or consult elected members on the Riverworks proposals.

He said "We should continue to press forward with our views to ensure the Vision Board, unelected/appointed by who I do not know, listen and act according to what the local community want rather than dictate to us their opinion based possibly on commercial interests"

Minutes always give a very limited picture of what actually went on at a meeting - this one was attended by 11 people, including David Borrow MP.

From the minutes we learn that the feasibility study into the docks project has been funded with a £120,000 grant from the NWDA. This feasibility study does not cover the proposals to build a barrage across the River Ribble, so one can only imagine how much extra public money the study into these proposals is likely to cost.

Jean Hunter of South Ribble Borough Council confirmed her authority's 'continued support' for the Riverworks project. (This is likely to come as news to many South Ribble councillors, who like the Preston Councillors, have largely been kept in the dark about the Riverworks proposals).

Jim Carr suggested that Riverworks could contain consideration of 'sustainable energy production' - If he means using the barrage to generate hydro-electric power, then this really is a non-starter, the amount of electricity that could be generated from the Ribble would be absolutely tiny compared with the immense environmental damage a barrage would cause. In order to get the 'head' of the river high enough to generate electricity for any length of time, the water level would need to be raised even more, vastly increasing the flood risk to locals.

"Contact Strategy"

The Vision Board are also having a big Public Relations drive, a 'contact strategy', which seems to be aimed at leading figures in the local media, as well as 'briefing key decision makers' (no mention of informing or consulting those people likely to be directly affected by their proposals, such as local Prestonians and South Ribblers living near the Ribble!)

Michelle Surrell, Managing Director of Rock FM and Magic 999 is to be invited to join the Vision Board, as well as this;

"a target list of decision makers to be developed with input from Alan Roff, Jim Carr and Jean Hunter and a draft script/key briefing points developed. Volunteer Vision Board members (preferably not local authority) requested; lunch to be provided/paid for the VB members....

Malcolm McVicar, Jeremy Gorick and Nicola Turner to arrange lunch with the editor of the Lancashire Evening Post"

We at 'Save The Ribble' are sure that the editor of the LEP has such high standards of journalistic integrity that he will not allow a lunch with these people to prevent him from fairly presenting both sides of the Ribble Barrage debate - though we would like to extend a cordial invitation, as part of our own 'contact strategy', to the editor to join us in a kebab from the Barakah Takeaway on Fishergate Hill, he can even have extra chilli sauce...

Preston - Capital City of Undemocratic Planning

Preston residents, and Save The Ribble members have been criticising Preston City Councils' whole approach to planning in the City.

Yesterday two biting letters from Aiden Turner-Bishop and David Whittle were published in the Lancashire Evening Post:

In Aiden's letter he describes the councils approach to city planning, with Riverworks, the Tithebarn project and now plans for Friargate, an approach that is "not only arrogant, but it's incompetent and careless ... in other words, wait until it's all stitched up and we'll pretend to listen to you".

David Whittle, of the Flag Market Debating Society weighs in too - "planners beware what you do when you use your pencil, with 'destroy' written on the right hand."

A common theme throughout all recent council planning announcements, and particularly those made by the "self-appointed grandees of the Vision Board" is that the council has been planning for rather than with local people - listening to the whims of profit hungry developers rather than asking the local people what they want or need. Aiden points out that "thoughtless errors will happen because the planners only listen to themselves".

If Preston continues on this course of destruction of everything that local people find valuable, our green spaces, our allotments, our football fields and recreation grounds, the mistakes and scandals of the 1980's will look like a vicars' tea party in comparison.


Residents Against Northern Trust

In other news of local people standing up to developers, the people of Lea turned out in force4 to oppose a development between Riversway, Finney Park Drive and Stoney Butts. They have set up 'RANT': 'Residents against Northern Trust' - who have put forward plans to build on land subject to subsidence, and swimming in all kinds of noxious substances.

The reality is that in Preston, all the good places to build housing have already been built on - there are usually very good reasons why vacant land has not yet been developed.

The green spaces that are left in this city are very precious to Preston people,and to wildlife, they're part of what makes Preston a decent place to live in - lets stick together to keep hold of them.