Sadness over town hall sale (From Craven Herald)

Sadness over town hall sale

9:26am Thursday 5th January 2012 in Letters

Sir – I have read with interest, but also with sadness, that Settle Town Hall has been sold to a private firm as it no longer has a place in local government.

I joined the staff of Settle Town Hall in January 1959, working in the engineer and surveyors department. At that time, about 24 people were employed there, plus the manual workers based in the depots.

Our responsibilities were many and varied. We were responsible for maintaining the public water supplies, sewage works and sewerage systems throughout the district, public conveniences, car parks, picnic areas, council house maintenance, public buildings such as the Victoria hall, together with Town and Country Planning and Building Regulations.

A separate highways department was responsible for the maintenance of Class 3 and unclassified roads.

The first things to go were the water works which were taken over by the Craven Water Board, but we still had plenty to do.

In 1966, the Council amalgamated the two departments and appointed a new surveyor, FG Wood, who set about doing all he could to improve the district.

We had a staff of 12 plus about 60 manual staff. We started to build car parks and picnic areas in many parishes – complete with public toilets. A new depot was built at Langcliffe. Council house building continued apace. Many highway improvements were undertaken. Snow clearing and gritting of roads was improved – no priority roads then, all roads were important. A snowblower was purchased and when it snowed, a fleet of ploughs were soon on the roads.

In 1974, the axe fell. The highways staff were transferred to the county council and the rest went to Craven District Council or the North West Water Authority, though many took early retirement or jobs elsewhere.

Settle Town Hall fell silent except for a few still based there. We felt that we had been taken over by Skipton. Out of the 24 staff at the town hall, only 12 were taken on by Craven and no ex-Settle RDC staff were appointed to a senior post at Craven, though to be fair some Settle staff took early retirement rather than go to Skipton or found work with other authorities.

I did quite well out of it, as I retired on a salary which I would never have got at Settle. However, my happiest working days were spent at Settle Town Hall. I am glad that it now looks as if the old place is likely to come alive again.

One more point – please note that Settle Town Hall never belonged to the people of Settle – it belonged to the people of Settle Rural District.

If money received from the sale is spent only on the parish of Settle, I’d expect people living in other parishes (eg Giggleswick or Langcliffe) to be up in arms, and the people of Bentham and Ingleton may even declare war!

Fred Hodgson, Embsay