I claimed a village green on two occasions on the Harcourt Street land to prevent it being built on. Some, just some, of the dodgy dealing by the LibDem Council is documented in my speech to councillors below.
I wasn’t going to bother to turn up tonight, because the decision has already been made, trees on the site were cut down weeks ago. We have dated photographic evidence. The Council knew the councillors of the ruling party would vote presumably as per instructions, even before the documents were sent out to them and before they heard the evidence.
I would like members of the committee to be aware that there are strict rules regarding village green applications. If illegal action has been taken by the Council and the village green is granted at a later date, then any development built on the site would have to be demolished. Given the dangers this location subjects 550 children to even after the contamination remediation, which the Council tried so very hard not to carry out at all, I shall do my utmost to have any building demolished. I have taken the precaution of keeping the Council’s insurers updated regarding all the illegalities, my attempts to draw them to the Council’s attention and the Council’s subsequent non-response. The insurers would not have to pay for the demolition of the school and reinstatement of the village green land, as they don’t have any liability where fraud or reckless action by councillors or council officers is concerned. I presume the council taxpayer won’t be able to find another £12 million plus to deal with this, so my assumption is that councillors and council officers would themselves potentially face financial liability in regards to this matter, particularly in the light of the fraudulent action which has been taken. I shall be sending the insurers details of the comments I have made at this meeting, so they have documentary evidence that these issues were raised with this committee.
The decision to refuse the village green was made before the application was even accepted. Mr. Hill was instructed not to receive it from me as I presented such an apparent danger to him. However, the Council has since admitted in writing, when I threatened to sue them that I am neither rude, nor offensive nor vexatious. How odd, then, that no council officer, nor the Mayor – Pam King – would accept this application. It is related, I am sure, to the fact that a compulsory purchase order can’t be made if there is an outstanding legal challenge to the land. I was told to deal with the Freedom of Information officer, who simply ignored everything – I have the documentary evidence.
Mr. Hill has a legal duty to act impartially with regards to the village green. He hasn’t. He demanded of me one sheet of a map which would cost £388. I have the documentary evidence. I doubt he demanded it of other village green applicants. He acted outside the law with regards to the compulsory purchase of the land at Harcourt Street and Goddard, Weldon and Derbyshire acted to prevent details of this illegal act getting in the public domain, and they are still preventing this.
The village green inspector, who does a lot of work for the Council and presumably wants to keep them happy, last time accepted my definition of the neighbourhood and locality (they were given me pro bono by a village green expert at Pannones). This time, for land in the same place and involving evidence, in the main, by the same people, he wouldn’t accept these definitions. Why not?
I suggest that opposition councillors, who have behaved impeccably in this whole school on a toxic dump issue and no blame is attached to them apart from Peter Scott, don’t vote as the Council wishes on the village green. The LibDems will do exactly as they are told, so the school will go ahead even without your votes, but what it means is all the blame and presumably liability lies with the LibDem councillors.
Sheila Oliver
14/04/10
