Calls for more transparency over talks with Dale Farm travellers (From Echo)
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Calls for more transparency over talks with Dale Farm travellers
8:50am Tuesday 29th December 2009 in Basildon
CRAYS Hill residents have called for more transparency from Basildon Council over discussions with travellers.
Parish councillors branded the district council secretive over negotiations it is involved in with travellers facing eviction from illegal sites at Dale Farm, Crays Hill, and Hovefields, Wickford, which they cannot attend.
They want to know why Surrey councillor Richard Bennett is involved and why no minutes and attendance records are kept.
Ramsden Crays Parish Council is writing to chief executive Bala Mahendran for answers.
Parish councillor John Lucas said at the latest parish meeting: “All our information stems from newspaper articles. Why has a Surrey councillor been brought in, and on whose say so? Who does he represent?
“There are no agendas, no minutes and no attendance lists. Why so much secrecy?”
Mr Lucas said he discussed the matter with district councillors who also appeared to be in the dark.
Mr Bennett, who chaired the Local Government Association Task Group on Travellers until it disbanded in 2007, previously told the Echo he had been brought in as a mediator and to find a solution to the unauthorised occupation of traveller sites in Basildon without leaving people homeless.
The Echo can now reveal he is involved at the request of the Gypsy Council, whose president is Richard Sheridan, a Dale Farm spokesman.
Mr Bennett declined to comment yesterday.
Tony Ball, Basildon Council leader, said: “Mr Bennett was invited by the Gypsy Council to take part.”
Dawn French, the council’s head of environment, added: “We agreed with all parties that notes would not be taken during meetings. The council and other parties do not feel it is constructive to have a running commentary in the press.
“Bearing in mind the very personal nature of some of these meetings, we wish to respect people’s right to privacy”
Comments(7)
evilc
says...
9:46am Tue 29 Dec 09
wickman
says...
10:55am Tue 29 Dec 09
wickman
says...
10:55am Tue 29 Dec 09
RAZOR BLADE
says...
6:58pm Tue 29 Dec 09
What can be so personal so as to stop Basildon Council upholding the law , what are they really hiding from the legal residents of Crays Hill .
midnight warrior
says...
10:37pm Tue 29 Dec 09
The judges that sit in their ivory towers do not seem to live in the real world because if they did they would punish these people for breaking the law instead of rewarding them by constanly offering Inquiries and Judicial Reviews to avoid the issue. I don't know anyone who wants these scroungers to stay but still we the majority public are told that minorities must be given preference.
As for Richard Bennett, get lost and go and save a lost cause in Surrey or some other place that actually wants you.
thelonewhinger
says...
3:35pm Wed 30 Dec 09
Who needs websites? talk to your friends and neighbours, discuss it with your workmates, bring it up at the pub, mums discuss it on the way home from school..... bottom line is - if it matters enough to you and yours, do something about it! You could simply arrange to gather at the Council offices at an agreed time and place for a start and make your voices heard.
The clue to what is really happening is in the article above "Mr Bennett was invited by the Gypsy Council" - exactly, for it is they who call the tune on this whole issue.
If Basildon folk are content to have unelected outsiders dictate how they deal with illegal non-taxpaying groups then so be it... and anyway, why all the concern with G/Ts being made homeless? It is afterall their birthright we are told to travel - so all the bailiffs will do is provide the impetus for them to do just that....
Final footnote : just reading in the Echo about the group who are threatened with having their greenhouse "forcibly removed" by the charitable Basildon council.....is the wooden building we provided still providing "valuable community service" to the G/Ts ....but that is a different story of course.
Discouraged says...
9:29am Tue 29 Dec 09