Saturday 5 July 2008

Hooray - they've won.

The residents in Netherley campaigning against the plans for a dump (HWRC) on Holt Lane have won their fight!

It's been one of those long sagas with a lot of twists and turns.

Basically, the Merseyside Waste Disposal Authority drew up a plan to use lane at Holt Lane for the dump. Holt Lane is quite narrow and has an industrial estate on one part. The industrial estate tenants weren't best pleased. But the people living in the houses nearby were particularly outraged. For all sorts of reasons, the site seemed a very bad choice.

The City Councils exec board came out against the whole scheme. Then planning permission was turned down.

You would think that would be an end to the matter. But MWDA decided to attempt to get its own way and appealed against the decision. The persistence of MWDA was very marked. Members refused to listen properly to protestors, or even to let them speak on occasions. Lib Dem Councillors on the authority resigned in protest. But the Labour majority pressed on with the scheme.

Residents in Netherley fought back, helped by Lib Dem Campaigner Tom Marshall and others.

And now they have won.

Well strictly speaking there is one more appeal avenue open to the MWDA but the quote in today's Liverpool Echo implies that they will look for another site rather than persist in the face of such opposition.

Two things stand out here. Firstly if the Labour members of MWDA had been more willing to listen to the real facts as explained by residents, the time wasting of the appeal need not have happened.
Secondly, a public authority which maintains rules preventing people asking questions or raising issues surely needs to change its rules pronto!

I have a feeling however that there will be other chapters in this saga - so expect to post again about it

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Not that this had anything to do with Marshall of course, the most bone idol, lazy councillor I ever come across! The voters of Belle Vale had the good sense to boot him out in May!