Congratulations Mr Speaker but what about my vote?

John Bercow will no doubt make a good a Speaker of the House of Commons but his election to that post could deny his constituents the democratic right to elect their MP. As the role of Speaker is non partisan he or she must resign from their political party but not from their seat in the Commons when they take up the role. Because of this there is a convention that the Speaker is not opposed at General Elections though this has not always been the case.

The position of the new Speaker in relation to his former political party is most interesting. It has become clear in recent days just how much his former colleagues despised him and pronouncements in the Bucks Herald by leading local Tories make it clear that they too had fallen out of love with him. Could it be that John Bercow would have been de-selected by the local Consrvative Party prior to the next election? Could it be that a new Tory candidate will be found to stand against the Speaker at the next election?

Local Liberal Democrats have been going through the process of selecting a new Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for the Buckingham constituency and will want that process to continue. Doubtless we will have to take advice from party headquarters about whether that new candidate stands against the Speaker at the next General Election but it could prove to be a very interesting situation.

WINSLOW GREEN DEVELOPERS GIVE IN!!

In a surprise move the would-be developers of Winslow Green have advised AVDC that they will not be appealing against the decision to refuse planning permission. This is great news for Winslow and the Horwoods but also for all communities in this part of rural North Bucks. However, it does indicate that Gladman Group are likely to pursue a new proposal to develop 250 homes on land between Little Horwood Road and Shipton hamlet. Llew has already expressed concern about this possible development as the land in question in included in the AVDC Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment as being suitable for 1,000 houses. Llew has persuaded the Town Council to hold an Open Day on July 11th when residents can see and comment on all possible development sites. More details on this coming soon.

Great effort but not quite enough for Llew

The full result of the County Council Election in Winslow was as follows.

Conservative 1553

Llew Monger 1225

UKIP 437

Commenting on the result Llew said ” I’d like to thank everyone who supported me on Thursday and assure them that I will continue to work hard for the benefit of local residents. Our returns show that we won the vote in the Town but not in the Villages which make up half of the County Division”

There is a long agenda of issues to be tackled in Winslow and the surrounding area and the Liberal Democrats will be active on all fronts. If you’d like to help Llew and the local Liberal Democrats in future campaigning you can contact us through this website or call Llew on 07808 096513.

Possible Housing sites revealed

Aylesbury Vale District Council have posted a report on their website which lists all sites being considered for possible housing development in the coming years. They didn’t bother to tell the Town Council or indeed any of the Parish Councils involved that the report was there so how are people supposed to know about it?

The real shocks are the possibility of 1,000 houses on land between Little Horwood Road and Shipton hamlet and the potential sale of the Sports fields at the Winslow Centre for even more housing. Commenting on the report Llew says, ”Just when we thought we’d seen off Winslow Green and its 3,300 houses we now find we have another massive potential development on our doorstep. As to the Winslow Centre land it’s disgraceful that anyone should even think about selling off sports fields for housing. I would be strongly opposed to any development here and I imagine most residents would feel the same”

The 120 page report covers the whole of the Vale and asseses sites as to how suitable they are for potential development. In our area sites are considered in Padbury, Great Horwood and Winslow but only the latter are included in the detail of the sites listed as ‘suitable for residential development’. It is important to note that no applications have been submitted for these sites as yet but the detail is as follows

Reference	Location	No. of dwellings	Comment
125/002	South of railway / east of Furze Lane	240	Subject to Transport Assessment andprovision of facilities and suitable linksrequired to overcome distance fromtown centre
125/006	Former Gas board Site Station Road	5	Ground conditions require investigation.
125/008	Land East of Little Horwood Road	1,000	Subject to Transport Assessment andprovision of facilities and suitable linksrequired to overcome distance fromtown centre and transport
125/009	Glebe Farm, Verney Rd West of Langley Close	38	Suitable if facilities provided indevelopment of site 125/001 toovercome distance from town centre
125/011	Former School playing field west of Winslow Centre	70	Suitable if developed in association with Site 125/002. Subject to TransportAssessment

TO VIEW THE FULL 120 PAGE REPORT FOLLOW THIS LINK.

http://www.aylesburyvaledc.gov.uk/GetAsset.aspx?id=fAAzADkANgAxAHwAfABGAGEAbABzAGUAfAB8ADAAfAA1

Llew will be raising this issue with the Town Council at the earliest opportunity and will ensure that the residents of Winslow have a proper opportunity to comment.

THE BURNING ISSUE

Literally – the ‘burning’ issue is the Tory County Council’s impending decision whether to locate an incinerator in our rural Aylesbury Vale. They postponed the final decision until after the elections are over, probably hoping to avoid the the opposition that will be stirred up if they announce the go-ahead! However, the cat is out of the bag thanks to the Stop Aylesbury Vale Incinerator (SAVI) group. SAVI will be holding a public meeting on Wednesday May 20th at 7.30pm in the Winslow Combined School and this will be an opportunity for residents of Winslow and other local villages to hear more about this possible threat to our health and safety.

The current prospect is that Waste Recycling Group, who run the Calvert landfill facility, will be the County’s preferred partner. They plan an incinerator with a 315ft high chimney on a site near the present landfill operation. Although the would-be developers and the County Council say the incinerator would be safe there is considerable concern among leading scientists about the safety of these plants. For example the presence of harmful particles in the gasses expelled from the chimney which can drift for miles and the risks from dust blown from, lorries transporting the residual ash away from the site. The proposed site is only five miles South West of Winslow and the prevailing winds would bring the gasses directly over the town and nearby villages.

Clearly we can’t just go on putting our waste into holes in the ground but we believe that there is vast scope for increasing the levels of recycling to the extent that there is no need for incinerators such as that proposed. In fact it seems that the Tory County Council plan to abandon all hope of improving recycling rates as the proposed facility would be capable of taking 50% more than the current total levels of waste for the whole County. So, do they plan to just burn everything?

For more information on the threat incinerators pose try these to websites.

www.ukwin.org.uk (UK Without Incinerators Network in conjunction with Friends of the Earth)

www.useyourbrain.org (Buckinghamshire Residents Against Incinerators)

Lib Dem storms from 3rd to 1st in Wycombe By-Election

The Liberal Democrat candidate, Steve Guy, had a sensational victory in a Wycombe District Council By-Election on Thursday when he gained a seat from Labour in a two member Ward where the other Councillor is a Conservative. Steve won with 733 votes (up 38.1%) the Conservatives polled 408 (down 8.32%) and Labour trailed in with 214 (down 29.79%). Clearly voters in Bucks are no more impressed with the local Tories than they are with Labour and this result augurs well for Liberal Democrats in the up-coming County Council Elections on June 4th.

UNAMIMOUS REFUSAL OF WINSLOW GREEN APPLICATION

At it’s meeting yesterday the Strategic Development Committee of AVDC voted unanimously to refuse the application for the Winslow Green Development. A string of speakers representing local councils, special interest groups and local residents condemmed the application on a wide range of grounds with only the developers Agent speaking in favour. This was followed by all but one of the Committee speaking on the subject and all of them were opposed.

Commenting after the meeting Cllr Llew Monger, who had addressed the committtee on behalf of Winslow Town Council, said ”This was the perfect result today and shows the power of public involvement. Over 1000 people have written to object and over 700 attended public meetings during the build-up to to today. However, whilst we have won this battle the war is probably going to continue. The developers have six months in which to register an appeal and in the past they have indicated that that is just what they will do. We will now have to turn our attention to other possible applications for large local developments while we wait to hear what the Winslow Green people intend to do.”

WINSLOW GREEN -AVDC OFFICERS REPORT RECOMMENDS REFUSAL!

The Officers Report, prepared by senior AVDC Planner Tony Barker, is published today and recommends REFUSAL of the Winslow Green application. Whilst this is what we hoped and expected there is no doubt that there is a great comfort factor in reading the detailed reasons for refusal. This report will go to all members of the AVDC Strategic Planning Committee which will meet at 1.00pm on Wednesday 1st April to consider the application. Members of the public are able to attend the debate which will be held in the Maxwell Hall at the Aylesbury Civic Centre in order to accommodate the numbers expected to attend.

Reasons given for the recommendation of refusal include the following; Conflict with Regional Spatial Strategy, intrusive development into the open countryside onto a Greenfield site, harm to the character and appearance of Winslow, failure to protect and enhance the environment, the adverse impact of the development on the vitality and viability of Winslow as a local shopping centre, traffic impact and inadequate provision of non-car modes of transport. All in all a pretty thorough demolition of the application!

You can read the full report by clicking on the link below but please allow time for it to load as it is 60 pages long!

http://wam.aylesburyvaledc.gov.uk:8080/WAM/doc/Report-854002.pdf?extension=.pdf&wmTransparency=0&id=854002&wmLocation=0&location=volume2&contentType=application%2Fpdf&wmName=&pageCount=60

Shipton Hamlet Conservation Area Review

The public consultaion period for the review of the Shipton Conservation Area closed on Friday 6th and Winslow Town Council joined almost all of the hamlet’s residents in calling for the designation to remain as it is. Originally the Tory Cabinet Member for Planned Development had called for Conservation Area Status to be removed due to changes since the last review in 1990. Liberal Democrat leader on AVDC, Cllr Alan Sherwell, ‘called- in’ the decision and the Environment Scrutiny Committee asked for a range of other options to be considered. A new review offered either ‘de-designation’ or a new reduced conservation area.

Llew suppported local residents at a meeting with AVDC and pointed out that any changes to the Conservation Area have been made with full planning permission given by AVDC so they can hardly say that those changes are responsible for the need to remove the Conservation Area status. Indeed at a time when the area immediately adjacent to Shipton is under threat of major development the District Council should be doing all they can to protect the area rather than making life easier for developers.

Local historian Julian Hunt has slammed the latest report as being ”ill conceived, hurried and thoroughly misinformed” and said that ”Such a flawed document should not form the basis of judgement of the AVDC Councillors who should reject it out of hand” We now await the decsion of the Cabinet Member and hope that common sense will prevail and the whole idea of ‘de-designation” be dropped.

End of Dispersal Order may bring more anti-social behaviour

The Dispersal Order which police have been operating in Winslow since last September expires on 19th March and there is real concern among many residents that disorder and anti-social behaviour levels could return to the levels we experienced last Spring and Summer. The order gives police the power to move on groups of people and has been particularly effective in stopping the mass gatherings of young people in Greyhound Lane Car Park. A side effect inititally was an increase in vandalism in the Churchyard and whilst this may not have been directly related it would have been better if this area had been included in the original dispersal order.

NEW EXTENDED DISPERSAL ORDER?

Following conversations with local police Llew Monger has written to Thames Vally Police and AVDC to support the idea of renewing the dispersal order for a further six months. Commenting on the situation Llew said ” An extension would see us through the Spring and Summer when the lighter nights and warmer weather have, in the past, brought problems with large groups of young people. The Town Council are working toward the provision of a Multi-Use Games Area and a Youth Shelter which would also help cambat anti-social behaviour by giving young people more things to do in the town.”