LIBERAL Democrat councillors are urging Warrington Borough Council to submit Peel Hall Park and other green spaces across the town for additional protection from developers.
Cllr Bob Barr, the Lib Dem spokesman on planning and the environment and new Poulton representative Cllr Sandra Bradshaw are putting a motion to next week’s meeting of the full council.
The motion regrets that Warrington has not put forward any recreational spaces for the Queen Elizabeth II Fields Challenge – an initiative which aims to safeguard outdoor recreation spaces in perpetuity to mark the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and urges the council to submit Peel Hall Park for the Challenge.
The two councillor say the Challenge offers a way of improving parks and safeguarding them against 
development at some time in the future.
Local amenity group The Friends of Peel Hall Park have already criticised the council for its failure to put the park forward for the Challenge but the council has indicated that it was decided to apply to the Challenge because the council already had policies and procedures committed to protecting green spaces.
The Queen Elizabeth II Fields Challenge is operated by Fields in Trust and led by the Duke of Cambridge and is a campaign designed to protect playing fields across the country as a permanent “living legacy” of the Jubilee – and also of the London Olympics.
It covers sports pitches, woodlands, children’s play areas, gardens, bicycle trails, parks and other recreational spaces – and hopes to preserve 2,012 green spaces.
Developers have had their eyes on land near Peel Hall Park for years and want to build up to 1,400 homes in the area. But the council’s policy is that the land should be retained as open, green space.
Pictured: Cllr Bob Barr and Cllr Sandra Bradshaw.
6 Comments
I’m glad the councillors are doing this because as we know the council’s approach to its own policies and procedures can be very flexible indeed and officers are seemingly free to do whatever they want in breach of those policies and procedures without any consequences. The more outside control we have over WBC, the better.
Exactly. It’s odd, but a truism, that you have had to say “The more outside control we have over WBC the better”. For so long now the council has been like a loose assembly of individuals or groups of them (officers and elected members) acting independently of each other without seemingly any common objective or sense purpose for the good of Warrington. Inevitably things regularly went wrong with frequent breaches of policies and procedures occurring; and no one held to account but everyone blaming the other for situations they all should have been managing for Warrington’s benefit.
Mill Lane playing field in Stockton Heath has been put forward for the Queen Elizabeth II Fields Challenge although I think the Parish Council have done it rather than WBC.
I can’t believe that Bob Barr has got the brass neck to put this forward
Why shouldn’t he?
Reflex
That’s a bit harsh on Bob Barr and I’m no fan of the woefully feeble response he had to the various scandals associated with the planning department. I’m glad he’s done it if only because we need somebody to keep the council in check.