Cuckoo in the nest: the IWCA in the council chamber
IWCA motion on asbestos prompts change of heart at town hall
Oxford City Council is taking steps to identify and remove potentially hazardous asbestos from its housing stock after IWCA councillor Claire Kent argued that it could be putting tenants and OBS workers at risk.
Following the adoption of Cllr Kent’s motion the council has issued asbestos advice to council tenants and leaseholders last month.
Training on asbestos handling for all OBS operatives has been organised and further specialist training for OBS managers and surveyors on asbestos analysis, surveying and managing will take place by the end of the financial year.
The council has also created a new full-time post to oversee the process of asbestos surveying and removal.
Most asbestos has already been removed from garage sites under a planned maintenance programme but in the meantime signs will be put up to indicate garages where danger from asbestos remains.
Claire Kent said, ‘It was obvious before that the political will to do this was lacking, even though there have been a number of highly publicised cases that should have started alarm bells ringing.’
In the council chamber the Housing Portfolio Holder, Labour’s Ed Turner, attempted to water-down the IWCA motion, arguing that there was insufficient evidence to show that the way the council was dealing with asbestos was endangering tenants.
Cllr Kent was able to persuade a majority of councillors to vote for her proposals after making an impassioned speech describing the minimal training provided to OBS staff and citing the experiences of a number of tenants with uncovered asbestos in their homes.
Cheap food not enough-Lidl turned down
Planning permission for a Lidl supermarket at the former Hartwells on the Watlington Road was rejected by the city council’s Strategic Development Control Committee in November last year.
Planning officers recommended the plans be turned down, essentially because there was felt to be insufficient need for another convenience store of this size in Oxford, and because the city centre and other local centres are supposed to be prioritised for such developments.
Against this, however, a new discount supermarket would give Blackbird Leys residents the opportunity to buy cheap groceries and would provide competition to the Tesco on the ring road.
In fact most of the objections raised against the Lidl store would apply equally to Tesco.
A more serious concern is the amount of extra traffic a new store would generate but the opinion of the Highways Authority is that the existing road network could absorb this.
Based on these arguments Cllr Claire Kent, the only IWCA member to sit on the Strategic Development Control Committee, voted in favour of granting planning permission.
In the end, though, a majority of the committee, which is dominated by councillors representing well-heeled wards in North and Central Oxford, voted to reject the application.
Lidl will be appealing against the decision.
Giving away your money
A decision by Labour councillors on the South East Area Committee to oppose a trivial planning application without any reasonable grounds could end up costing Leys residents thousands of pounds.
When NIMBYs in Iffley Village took exception to plans for a porch outside the applicant’s house, the Labour majority on the area committee decided to back their cause and deny the application, even though qualified planning officers argued that they could see no legal objections to it.
As a result the area committee could be forced to mount a costly defence at a court appeal, with little realistic prospect of winning the case.
Earlier this year, the council paid out £8,000 after a refusal to allow the demolition of two bungalows to build apartments was overturned.
The cost of fighting appeals due to planning applications rejected at area committee meetings now comes out of the budget for that area.
On top of this, the government also claws back part of its planning delivery grant if it feels the council is ‘underperforming’ when it comes to planning.
Last year the council lost £50,000 because of this.
IWCA councillor Stuart Craft said, ‘Residents of
this etate could lose out on a share of area committee funds because of a completely unnecessary court case.
Why did Labour councillors choose to support a lost cause on behalf of the well-to-do Iffley Villagers rather than stick up for Blackbird Leys interests?’
Leys Independent, issue 31, February 2006
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