Paul Smith has just invited me to this, through Facebook - Save Grove Woods, Snuff Mills march next Sunday. Although it's not really a march, more like a country walk through some lovely woodland. Don't be confused by the Google map on the Facebook site, which is linked to the Broomhill Road in Brislington, rather than the one in Stapleton. I will be there.
Sunday, 18 January 2009
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7 comments:
Who does the land belong to ?
A gentleman called Lord Jafari - not a Lord he just changed his name to Lord
Knowing Guthrum as I do, I suspect his point was more along the lines of an Englishman's home being his castle and get your tanks off my lawn you rambling beardy hippies...
I had guessed that but provided the information anyway in the interest of transparency. Of course the area does include a public right of way, another under consideration and is a conservation area - which means that rights to develop and use as you like is restrcited
Well that was bracingly informal, and very well attended, how was it for you, Kerry?
To me, the outstanding issues here are: how did this actually happen in the first place? How did this Jafari character get his hands on the land at all? How can community groups stop this sort of disaster ever happening again?
At one of the Counts Louse demonstrations I met a lovely old gent who had brought along his certificate of ownership that he had from a previous community purchase of Grove Woods some 10 or 15 years ago.
Some have said that certain people got into a position at the top of this community group where they had the power to sell the Woods without consulting the 200 or so members of the community who had paid to purchase the land.
The first that local people knew that the land had been sold was when Jafari and his men started turning up to have their way.
Do you have any more information about this fiasco?
From your position of knowledge and expertise, what advice could you offer as to how we can permanently safeguard our last few bits of greenspace from the developers who have so much more power, influence and resources at their disposal than ordinary people do?
Well if you didn't insist on hiding under the cover of a pseudonym you could have approached me and Paul Smith (who is the real expert) and had a proper conversation about it this afternoon. I assume you're following the blog? - http://snuffmills.blogspot.com/ There's loads of information on there.
As for your question - the planning process, local plans, the Regional Spatial Strategy, TPOs, making areas areas of outstanding natural beauty or sites of special scientific interest, rules protecting rare species, the Habitats Directive, rights of way legislation, village greens, etc, etc. There's all sorts of restrictions on what can be done with land, even if it is in private ownership.
"... the planning process, local plans, the Regional Spatial Strategy, TPOs, making areas areas of outstanding natural beauty or sites of special scientific interest, rules protecting rare species, the Habitats Directive, rights of way legislation, village greens"
All this stuff is beyond a joke, Kerry, it is a load of bureaucratic nonsense that just makes work for the growing armies of bureaucrats and non-jobbers.
It simply isn't up to the job of conserving our heritage, wildlife and quality of life from the onslaughts of greed and concrete.
As to "hiding" you can cast your aspersions as you like, but the way I see it is, who or what I am is irrelevant. What I have to say can be taken in or ignored as people choose.
Sorry that you can't answer my questions. Would you really answer them any better face to face?
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