On May 16th 2010 I sent this complaint to Council Monitoring Officer Barry Khan. As is the norm with Barry Khan,
nothing was done about this issue and there is still a problem with Roberts and his declaration of interests in 2013. We need an honest council. We won’t have that whilst these officials, responsible for so much that is wrong in our town, remain in place.
This document can be more clearly read at:- http://www.sheilaoliver.org/councillor-iain-roberts,-smbc.html
This is the then and current roadscheme project leader writing to me about costs. In reality at the time she was writing the costs had risen from £170m to £1 billion, yet no-one except Councillors Bailey, Harding and I turned a hair about this. Same officials and councillors are still in charge. What are the current costs? We don’t know and can’t find out because the Project Leader’s files are apparently in such a mess. If you are a Greater Manchester council taxpayer – be very afraid.
Last time the road was on the cards I was allowed to see the minutes. This time the project leader’s files are in such a mess that apparently it will take 40 hours to find the meeting minutes.
I have offered to pop in to help with the filing but my very kind gesture has been ignored. So, the LibDems are in charge of a £300 million project yet the relevant documents seem to be in a big heap somewhere.
Dearie me, oh dearie me! LibDem incompetence yet again.
Why choose a developer with no funds with a guarantor with no funds for a seriously contaminated site?
http://www.sheilaoliver.org/blackstone,-offerton.html
http://www.sheilaoliver.org/blackstone-gb-building-solutions.html
In a response to my council meeting question asked 26/2/13 dated 5th March 2013 Stockport Council Executive Committee states:-
“The Council regrets the amount of time it has taken to bring forward the comprehensive regeneration of Offerton Precinct.” (But why so long only to find itself in a corner?).
“At present, the Council is not expecting to bear any capital costs associated with this scheme although there is always some element of risk in any such project. The Council has considered these risks carefully and is prepared to accept these risks to ensure the scheme moves forward.” (The risks could have been minimised long ago. Last minute trauma is not a good place to be when making these decisions. Many years have gone by etc).
The brief response to my question says a lot! The council regrets the time taken to get nowhere – i.e., to “bring forward the comprehensive regeneration of the Precinct” to a point where it was forced into a corner by the former Precinct owners.
At present they are not expecting to bear any capital costs but acknowledge risk, risk risk – wait and see.
Why didn’t the LibDem area committee or the LibDem Executive or Steve Burns, top planning banana, do the sensible thing and allow the Lisburne Group to have developed this site in concert with the wishes of local people back in circa 2006?
Shenanigans, and no mistake!
We must challenge LibDem lies every time they raise their ugly heads. Councillor Roberts states: “The Council has been working tirelessly for many years to secure the redevelopment of Offerton Precinct.” Lie. The Council has been working tirelessly for many years to cover the backs and protect the business interests of the former owners of the Precinct site and one can only guess at why.
I repeatedly asked questions about why the owners were not being made to keep their precinct in good repair. No real answer and no action taken against the Precinct owners It represented a serious danger to local people, as this photo shows:-
http://www.egi.co.uk/news/article.aspx?id=724702
This is what the former owners of Offerton Precinct get up to. Why did the LibDem Area Committee, Executive Committee and senior council officers at Stockport offer them golden planning elephants when it was known full well what sort of company they were and the shenanigans they got up to. One cursory look at the Precinct would have informed the Council what sort of company they were dealing with. Why was the Lisburne Group’s planning application to keep the local businesses and a new convenience store continually blocked by the LibDems?
It is the failure of the LibDem local councillors and the LibDem administration that led to this deplorable situation. The chutzpah of Roberts to claim the Council worked tirelessly to sort this situation out takes my breath away.
Had the Lisburne Group application been passed, the then owners of the Precinct would have been left with a worthless piece of land, because what was hidden at the time but much later emerged was that there was a covenant on the Tenbest (Precinct owner’s) land preventing housing being built on it. So, had the Lisburne Group developed the shops on their existing land, the Tenbest/Noe family would have been left with land which couldn’t be developed. Did Tenbest/the Noe family, have friends at LibDem court? We can only guess!
According to the excellent Mr John Tyers:-
“85,000 SEMMMS leaflets were sent out. The population of Stockport is 283,000. If you send questionnaires to the 30 per cent of the borough – such as Bramhall and Cheadle – where car ownership is very high, voters will tend to want their money spent on roads. If you go, however, to the poorer districts you would expect a very different result. Ten years ago 250,000 leaflets were distributed and three per cent of them were returned in favour of building the road. This time around we have no meaningful result. We have simply wasted public money.”
which dealt with Mr Parnell are/were dealing with this case:-
