| Topic: | Re: STENCH of the TORIES PREVAILS | |
| Posted by: | Steve Taylor | |
| Date/Time: | 20/09/11 18:35:00 |
| "Although proper for Members to consider the consequences of voting against approval why does it seem that they took more notice of Richard Aylard from Thames Water than their own officers?" To compound the blunders made by the Tories and to remind everyone of the fiasco of the badly chaired SDC, it should be noted that normally members of the public, who have offered written objections, are permitted to address the committee before the vote is taken. In this instance the letters were sent out to residents after the deadline to request permission to speak had already passed!!! I, and a neighbour of mine at the time who happens to hold a PhD in chemical engineering, objected to this shoddy behaviour by the Planning Dept. I therefore emailed the Chair of SDC, Cllr Sheila O'Reilly, the Director of Environment and Planning, Michael Jordan, and every Councillor sitting on the SDC and requested that, in light of my request to speak being submitted after the deadline (through no fault of my own), the Mogden application be deferred until the next SDC sitting so that I and my neighbour could speak. I followed up my email with a phone call to the Director of Planning but was told by his PA that he was not available to speak to me but she confirmed that in checking his email in-box, my email had been read! I was therefore quite surprised when the meeting opened and the Chair, Cllr Sheila O'Reilly, made no mention of my request and the meeting proceeded. Cllr Ruth Cadbury interrupted up and drew attention to my email but the Chair (and here's the crunch) said that she had not read any emails because she had been to the optician and was still having trouble with her eyes so she had not read any emails for the day!!! You couldn't make it up! In any event said temporarily visually impaired Tory Chair of SDC gleefully announced that the meeting would go ahead as it was not a residents 'right' to speak - To quote her "the Agenda stands - the application will be heard" |