How can you be right about the results of an inquiry that hasn't happened?

Coming from you that is a bit rich.

I was right when I said trying to prove dewatering was the cause of the cracks in Victoria Park was an impossible task, and to attempt to do so was a fool's errand.

It wouldn't have been hard had West Berkshire Council done their job.

in what way?

Proper monitoring of the environment. The project required dewatering, it would seem that no provision was put in place to monitor its affect on the environment.

there would be no point.

all I'd get would be an answer in the form of obfuscation & waffle.

Well that should pose no problem for our resident WBC and Newbury expert,; especially if you get User to assist you?

I think I'm with Dannyboy on this, there was no need for the study, no need for such scrutiny over something fairly obvious. They would have been better off giving the money to the Bowls Club

So why give money to the bowls club? Were the bowls club not insured? Would not the insurance companies then claim any monies paid out back from Costains? What about the buildings affected by the cracking? I thought there was more damage than to the park alone?
Just how is the bowls club funded?

It seems to me that an initial £5k hydrogeological study was prudent enough if they were looking at a potential £100k+ of damages, but when the study came back equivocal and when the damage turned out not to be so very great they should have dropped the matter, late 2010.

Initial quotes to bring the bowls club up to snuff were in the order of £20k, but that got talked-up and conflated with the cost of taking down some chronically under-managed conifers that shade the bowling greens.

The bowling greens and the rest of the alleged damage could have been put right by Spring 2011 for less than the council has spent so far on legal fees, and without Parkgate to distract the council they might not have muffed the Heritage Lottery Bid and we'd have got a park makeover at no cost to the tax-payer.

Would'a, could'a, should'a. They'll all get voted in again in 2015. Plus ça change...

We should have given you the job then!

Quite so. I suspect that the wittering about the cost of repairing the Bowls club greens is simply larding a the claim. Even with the scant detail provided it's pretty obvious that this claim is pretty dubious to say the least.

My hourly rates are beyond the coffers of NTC.

Would not the insurance companies then claim any monies paid out back from Costains?

funny that - given that insurance companies / lawyers will chase the most dubious of claims if there is some cash to be made that no claim has been made.

Quite so, even the no win no fee boys give NTC a wide berth. As for the rightness or otherwise of commissioning the report in the first place, Andy Capp has really hit the nail in the head; consistently asking why the principle landlord and the authority agreeing to the pumping have remained so silent.

asking why the principle landlord and the authority agreeing to the pumping have remained so silent

cos there is nothing to say. but you can't come out & say that, just in case.

I was making the point that if they are just throwing good money after bad, they could have done something with it that would have made a difference. They have essentially thrown it down the drain.

That's a real Sir Humphrey answer! Well done, WBC's PR people couldn't have done better.

Just in case they (evidently) didn't do their job right.

There's no doubt in my mind that this is a West Berkshire Council F-up; NTC are just the Patsies.