NTC are going to decide how to progress the cracks snafu on Wednesday evening in a secret sessions of the full council. Always disappointing when the council prevent public scrutiny of matters such as this, and I doubt very much if it would have dragged on as long as it has if they'd been open and transparent as government is required to be. We do after all pick up the bill for this. It's particularly unimpressive that they have still not disclosed the hydrogeological reports.
According to the council their case is robust so we can expect the council to begin court action without further delay. I'm guessing this is what they'll do, not so much because I think their case is robust, because I don't, but because the alternative of admitting that they've wasted the best part of £100k on a dispute that they should never have pursued will be just too painful. Starting legal action is the obvious answer for a council that's dug itself into a hole, because they can easily drag their heels for a couple more years and that will put off the inevitable crisis. They'll be able to hide behind their court action for years and years without saying anything at all about what's going on, and if it does all come to an end one day there's a good chance no one will notice.
It's just about within the realms of possibility that the council will decide to drop the matter and spin it as some kind of success, but the cracks snafu has been such a rich source of busy work for the council that I just can't see them letting it go. Of course a good strategy will just be to say nothing and carry on, and if we don't have definitive news that they have issued a county court claim then we can assume this is what they've decided to do. Whichever, I hope the NWN take the opportunity to cover the story with some in-depth analysis and comment, and I particularly hope that they look into the council's failure to disclose the reports and the soundness of the council's decisions there.
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Right an injustice - give Simon Kirby his allotment back!
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