West Craven
| DALES FOLK |  | | | PICK OF THE PAST | | | READERS' LETTERS | | | COUNTRYFILE | | | | CARTOONS | | |
|
|
|
Pair criticised over meeting walkout
"Childish" actions have left Barnoldswick Town Council in turmoil, a councillor has claimed.
Last Wednesday's meeting of the council's planning committee was stopped shortly after it started when two councillors walked out.
Keith Bailey and Jenny Purcell left because they were unhappy that a fellow committee member had failed to turn up for the meeting.
Coun David Stead had sent his apologies because he had been held up at work.
The walkout left the meeting without a quorum as just two councillors remained - Richard Whiteley and Margaret Bell - and the meeting had to be abandoned.
A quorum is the minimum number of people allowed at a meeting before any transactions take place.
One of the planning applications due to be discussed at the meeting was the controversial scheme to build a supermarket on the Butts.
Also present at the meeting were representatives from Maple Grove, the developers behind the supermarket plans, and more than 15 members of the public.
Coun Whiteley, chairman of the planning committee, said he and Coun Bell had been left perplexed and bemused by the walkout.
He said: "These childish actions have left the committee and public in turmoil as very little time is left to reschedule the vital meeting before a decision (on the supermarket proposals) is made."
He said it was important all points were heard and that the council's comments were passed on to the West Craven Area Committee, which will make the final decision on the plans.
"This has now been put in jeopardy," said Coun Whiteley.
He added that Coun Bailey and Coun Purcell's reason for leaving on the grounds of poor attendance was hypocritical.
"Both have a worse attendance record than Coun Stead," he said.
"Councillors Purcell and Bailey have only attended three out of the previous six meetings while Coun Stead has attended four."
Coun Purcell said she had left the meeting mainly because a member of the committee had not turned up to discuss an important issue that affected every resident of Barnoldswick.
However, she was also concerned that the acting town clerk was absent and Coun Bell was taking the minutes.
"How can a town councillor, a member of the West Craven Area Committee and a Pendle Borough Councillor be impartial, vote and take minutes on this controversial issue?" she asked.
Coun Bailey, who left shortly after Coun Purcell, said it was an important meeting for the people of the town.
He said: "I felt that everybody should have made a special effort to turn up. That is why I agreed with Coun Purcell and walked out."
Coun Bell said she had spoken to Pendle Borough Council's monitoring officer who said anybody could take notes at a meeting.
"At the end of the day the minutes are approved by the people present at the meeting, so they are a true account of what happened," she said.
"Coun Stead had sent apologies because he could not get out of work, which was quite genuine. To object to that was astonishing and brought the council into disrepute."
The planning meeting is due to be rescheduled for Wednesday May 14.
The decision on the supermarket proposal is due to be made at the West Craven Committee meeting at the end of the month.
3:36pm Thursday 24th April 2008
Print 
Email this 
Comment
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
