Cornwall's Tories: community asset strippers

Following my questions to the Council about the office transformation plan, Council Leader Alec Robertson wrote a letter to local newspapers saying they own over 4,000 properties, and suggesting that disposing of 48 of these is really not that significant. I don't agree, but I do think that if he wants to communicate directly, openly, and transparently with the public he shouldn't just tell us half of it.

So let me refer to two other Council properties which they are currently marketing:

(1) Devoran Old School. On Monday evening I was one of over 100 people who attended a meeting called by Devoran Action Group. This group has been working to develop plans for the community to take over the village centre building and develop it as a community centre with a nursery, after school clubs, village shop, and other employment units. The Council backed this scheme by applying for it to be one of two possible community asset transfer pilots and access government funding. The outcome of this bid is not yet known, but those at the meeting on Monday evening want it to go ahead. However, while the Council is waiting for the outcome of the bid they have put the property on the open market, and say that if Devoran Action Group cannot come up with a competitive bid and available funds by 11 February (next Thursday) they will accept one of the other bids they have so far received. The fact that they are trampling on the wishes of the community seems to make no difference.

(2) Old Richard Lander School site - which is in the ward I represent as a councillor. This site was placed back on the market on 23 January 2010. Now this is one of very few brownfield sites in Truro, and one which local residents accept could sensibly be used for new social and affordable homes. The draft Truro and Threemilestone Action Plan - which has been through public consultation - ear-marked the site for housing development including 50 per cent affordable housing as it is currently public sector land. But the Council has now ignored it's own plan and advertised the land as suitable for development of a district retail centre, with limited housing, of which only 35 per cent will be expected to be affordable. The fact that they are trampling on community aspirations to meet the need for social and affordable housing on a suitable, available site which is in public ownership seems to make no difference.

Neither of these Council property decisions has been communicated well, or fairly, to the communities involved. Indeed, as a councillor, the only communication I previously had about the Council's change of thinking on the Richard Lander School site was an anonymous letter with a Plymouth postmark, which was sent to all Truro councillors.

I am glad the Liberal Democrats lost control of Cornwall Council last year, but the fact that their group of councillors then refused to work as part of a no overall control Council leadership means that - frankly - they have no-one else to blame for their current exclusion from decision-making, no matter how often they throw their toys out the pram at scrutiny and other meetings, as they did today. Choosing to be Liberal Democrat is choosing to support a political Party that will never form a UK government, but they could if they wanted to accept responsibility for stopping the worst excesses of Cornwall's new Council leadership, rather than opt to protest feebly and futilely from the wings. This is not just about Council properties east of Bodmin, important though these are to residents in east and north Cornwall.

I have no illusions about the Tories. I saw what they did at every level of government in the 1980s and it didn't work. What they did impoverished and damaged entire communities including many in Cornwall. People were made homeless while unscrupulous profiteers cashed in by buying repossessed first homes and turning them into holiday lets - not least, in this constituency. If you want to find out what 'broken Britain' - or broken Cornwall - would be like, time travel to the 1980s by asking someone who can remember.