- This document (below) shows a lot of concerns by every section of society, even those that are working on and for the project, let alone those angry residents in Threemilestone and beyond, who already suffer disproportionately from the chaos between Chiverton Cross and Treliske Hospital/Highertown, where the air is already so bad, Cornwall Council designated it an AQMA (Air Quality management Area) in 2015!
But…. there are alternatives to that of pumping hundreds of millions of taxpayers’ money into a catastrophic scheme at an over-stretched Truro “Western Corridor”, otherwise known by Phil Mason and his planning team as “a mess”:
THE NEXT INSTALMENT BECAUSE THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE.
You have less reason to fear that which elitists CALL extremism than you do the extremism OF the elitists.
Dear Councillor Egerton,
Further to our recent excellent discussion, some further thoughts.
I am a strong believer in lateral thinking, the more so in the case of Cornwall Council’s ham-fisted approach to Langarth, where to be brutally frank, Cornwall Council in its infinite wisdom is in the process of tying a very tight knot with its testicles, that it will never ever unpick with its teeth!
In business, I often found that an unconventional disruptive approach intended to throw the opposing side into disarray would often turn the tables in a very positive manner, when a situation was at the outset, not favourable.
The entire Langarth process has, as a willing buyer, involved Cornwall Council cosying up to a vendor who claims to hold the trump card, but who in reality, must be increasingly desperate to make a return to appease private investors, who themselves while accepting the risk they are taking, will eventually require a substantial return on their investment, and which appears to be all that is keeping, as you well know, a very financially dubious vendor afloat.
The situation as you recently kindly explained being that the vendor, in your words “had probably been too clever for their own good”, this has created the seemingly impenetrable legal minefield that fortunately appears to be gumming up the works, thus delaying completion and increasing costs.
This suggests that were it a little more savvy, Cornwall Council would arbitrarily withdraw from the process, leaving the vendor, as I previously suggested in an interview with Cornish Stuff, “thrown in the corner to rot”; this strategy is given weight by the fact that other potential purchasers have previously walked away from the Langarth site, and it would potentially revert back toward agricultural value; but that would not be Cornwall Council’s problem, unless there were further undisclosed vested interests that bind it to a deal at any cost!
I am heartened by the Prime Minister’s statement recently, that all developments should focus on brownfield sites, and this could conceivably be Cornwall Council’s get out of jail free card.
If this were to be so, Cornwall Council could even regain a little of its shredded credibility by including the Langarth site in the proposed forest for Cornwall, to the real benefit of the people of Cornwall.
Your thoughts would be appreciated.
Yours aye
Kevin Bennetts
One of the major problems at Langarth, where 4,000 new homes are planned – 100% of which is statistically aimed at in-migration – is that of sewerage, where there is no infrastructure in place at the site, so holding tanks will need to be built, and lorries used to ship the raw human sewage past Treliske to Newham for processing; because SWW have openly admitted that Newham has already reached capacity some years ago, this might explain the raft of anecdotes about raw sewage discharge on our farmland, in our ports and directly out to sea at various villages around Cornwall, further explaining the high incidence of Hepatitis E in Cornwall and other infections, especially among surfers and holiday-makers; this also makes SWW complicit in the falling standards of water quality and increasing flooding and subsidence at homes across the Duchy. Some anecdotes and links below, all relating to this sad state of affairs:
www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/man-develops-serious-infection-after-3799610
“Scared. Think I may lose my home again this weekend .... to SWW sewage. I’m a sitting duck and there’s nothing I can do except wait. This is no life, this is hell. Over 100 sewer floods and here we go again.”
“Lord Matthew Taylor of Goss Moor is on the board of SWW while his wife was a big cheese at SAS where poop is firmly off the agenda according to those who have been blocked by SAS for flagging the issue up... It makes one wonder due to the apparent incestuous web self of interest does it not?”
"Need support.
I've spent 11 years fighting South West Water and Cornwall Council trying to save my home and my town.
I have uncovered a very big secret that they don't want to come out.
My story does effect homeowners in Hayle. I have gone out of my way to protect my neighbours. I refused to block the water pipe up with concrete as the council suggested 8 years ago as I was worried it would backwash and subside my neighbours homes. And I morally would not sell my home on to some poor unsuspecting buyer.
We still don't know the source of the water or where it's coming from in these pipes. There is not just one pipe, it's a network. Unlogged, unmaintained and uninsurable. So you see where that leaves people.
So no one is liable when they collapse with running water that SWW can't seem to turn off.
The council have put my council tax on hold till it was resolved but have now moved goalposts and switched my account number and trying to take me to court for non payment of council tax to paint me as the villain.
George Eustice knows there is a civic menace for Hayle and despite me and many others going to him for 8 years now he has done nothing. I suggest you all email him to ask him to do his job. In 2012 my insurance company advised me to go to George Eustice along with neighbours to put pressure on SWW to adopt this old crumbling networks under the Water Act. He has done nothing to protect us.
Press and Journolists will be there and many others. Friends on here please come to support me.
We are outside court from 12.30 onwards.
Write to George Eustice and ask him to do his job.
george.eustice.mp@parliament.uk
#doyourbloodyjob
#save our houses
Demand he forces SWW to adopt the networks."
HERE ARE SOME OF THE PITFALLS AND CONSTRAINTS INHERENT IN THE DISPOSAL OF HUMAN WASTE INTO FARMLAND. THIS DISGUSTING PRACTICE IS ON THE INCREASE BECAUSE MANY OF CORNWALLS SEWAGE NETWORKS ARE OVERLOADED BY MASS DEVELOPMENT WITHOUT THE CORRESPONDING INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT BY SWW.
www.wte-ltd.co.uk/sewage_sludge_biosolids.html
“Kevin, with regards to Langarth, a good friend of mine runs a very large sewerage disposal business in Suffolk. He tells me that his company empties the kind of storage tanks you mention, on a daily basis. The rule of thumb is 18 households per tank we per day. The maths is staggering!”
Just posted on SAS site:
With so many events, such a wide support network and goodwill, and such huge funding by ordinary local people, it’s a real tragedy that SAS have so many of their « leading lights » as directors or otherwise of SWW, one of the leading culprits in the hyper-development destroying much of Cornwall and causing such devastating sewage and flooding issues because of its structural inability to cope (as quietly and privately admitted by many of its managers on the ground).
I used to fully support and respect SAS completely. Now I see you as part of the vested-interest problem. Now our villages and bays are drowning in toxic human sewage.
What a waste of an opportunity, to fight corporate greed wrecking Cornwall’s unique social and environmental heritage.
Shame on SAS.... ☹️
Below are a couple of letters from campaigners about our Cornwall Council; it’s not very pleasant, in terms of business practice, competence and efficiency:
AN INCISIVE COMMENT ON THE RAPIDLY RISING BODY COUNT ON THE FOURTH FLOOR AT KREMLIN KERNOW IN THE LAST FEW MONTHS.
''In recent times in 2019 we have seen three strategic directors and a senior manager leaving the council or giving their intentions of leaving. These people were all on salaries in the region of £140,000 per anum plus expenses, all of which raises question as to why?
The planned departure is that of Mr Paul Masters, who has responsibilities including the environment, neighbourhoods and public protection, fire service. localism and the “double devolution approach” ( I have been advised that there are some senior executives on County Hall’s 4th floor who claim they have no idea of what this means, I wonder if Mr Masters does?).
Mr Masters replacement has been named as Ms Sophie Hosking, a past employee who had led the council’s controversial “alternative service delivery” (outsourcing) in 2013/14.
The departure of Mr Andy Brown the section 151 and chief operating officer reads like a murder mystery.
It appears that Mr Brown had a reputation for straight talking and willingness to challenge the chief executive.
I have been advised that Mr Brown had concerns about the council’s high tech “Oracle Cloud” (EPR) project , which is spectacularly over budget ( £3.2 million) and far behind schedule.
Mr Brown was the officer who highlighted the unauthorised spending of £2 million of tax payers money by Mr John Betty, Mr Brown left in November 2019, the reason for leaving being given as ‘personal reasons’ which very few who know him believed.
We have been advised that one council official claimed “County Hall is like a war zone and there is talk of hiring private detectives to look into some of the personal reasons that all too frequently and conveniently surface at county hall when people leave.
At the moment it’s all about who you know, it’s not healthy, particularly if you stand up to CEO Kate Kenally, it has been likened to is being in a gang, there are those who owe everything to Kate, and there are those who don’t”.
Now we find that Andy Brown’s replacement as chief operating officer is Ms Tracey Langley a past employee of Haringey Borough Council, (coincidentaly neighbouring Barnet) who was undoubtedly known to the chief executive Kate Kenally and was obviously standing by in the wings waiting for her call.
Cornwall Council is well aware that in 2014 Ms Langley, then known as Ms Evans, who, according to the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, had been found guilty of breaching professional standards when she forged signatures without consent in a past employment.
FROM FLYING HIGH IN HARINGEY FLYING TO FLYING LOW AT KREMLIN KERNOW!...
This interesting script so far should include the suspicion that Mr Brown was also subject to a gagging order, I suspect there are people at county hall who know the truth.
Transparency, not a sign of it, but who is kidding who?
We now see a past chief planning officer, (we all know who that is as he wafts seemingly untouchably around the hallowed corridors of Kremlin Kernow) who in 2009 was guilty of switching his own officers planning decision report, an incident reported to have had attracted a police investigation, promoted to being a Strategic Director. It appears that this person has also a public petition in progress for his removal because in the opinion of many his conduct adversely affects the wellbeing of Cornwall.
“Cornwall Council sent their negotiating team on the same course as Theresa May where the cost of the course included a white flag and pole ! Somewhat inline with the saying, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory ! From various sources, i hear Cornwall Council are hopelessly failing when negotiating, particularly on land for developments and big contractors, such that they are seen as lambs to the slaughter !”
“I don't know about any of you but I have had enough of elected representatives not doing what they were elected to do, it boiled up so I had to sit down and write a letter to this vacuous patronising MP who pretends to represent me.
Subject: AN OPEN LETTER TO SARAH NEWTON MP (in 2018)
Dear Mrs Newton
Many of us are increasingly appalled by the apparent buck passing between you (as our elected Government Representative) and Cornwall Council, with regard to development policies in general, but in this instance, relating to Langarth Farm in particular, which, via the “free Stadium for Cornwall”, has been allowed to become yet another political football, which last time around almost certainly assisted your re-election.
Times inevitably move on, so given the significant and growing dissatisfaction evident due to the explosion of concentrated intensive development hot-spots in your constituency, as well as your apparent complete lack of concern over the increasing disruption this is visiting on your constituents, Cornish Solidarity respectfully suggests that it may take more than the carrot of a stadium to save your seat next time around.
Having recently moved from St Day to Gwennap, you are now my constituency MP, therefore I am writing to you in that capacity, on behalf of Cornish Solidarity, to express the group’s deep concerns, with regard the issues articulated above that are located in your constituency.
I received your usual immediate robotic (out of office) response, to our email calling for a public enquiry into alleged irregularities at Langarth, and sent to multiple recipients from Cornish Solidarity (transparency and openness is our policy), in relation to concerns relating to potential malpractice by the Langarth developer, so this formal letter is a follow up to impress on you the seriousness of our concerns and send a very clear message that you really should not ignore this matter.
Various players at Lys Kernow, when challenged, constantly complain about buck-passing, which Cornish Solidarity views as a disgraceful cop out that all concerned should be deeply ashamed of, because in reality the wool is being pulled over your electorate’s eyes.
This farrago of half truths, untruths and general muddying of already murky waters needs to be urgently addressed and stopped forthwith, before all respect is lost in a smokescreen of obfuscation; we expect honesty and clarity, first, last and always, and we will settle for nothing less!
While the buck is being endlessly passed around, your constituents are being increasingly buffeted by events that do not benefit them nor does it make their lives any better.
The sheer number of often substandard new houses coming on stream is doing nothing to help your often hard pressed home-seeking constituents, because the homes remain stubbornly unaffordable, despite the help-to-buy and housing benefit “rackets”, which in reality are direct taxpayer funded handouts to developers and buy-to-let landlords, effectively yet another cynical con to dumb down the more docile victims even further.
Factor in the inescapable fact that these houses are being aggressively marketed nationwide, and it necessarily follows that a proportion will be snapped up as second homes with many more being bought by out of Cornwall investors as buy to let assets that are subsequently let at the absolute maximum rental level the housing benefit system will bear, with all of it at taxpayers’ expense, while the landlords get all of the financial benefits that accrue, rather that the hard pressed tenants.
Again, your reticence with regards to the curse of second homes in your constituency is disgraceful, doing you no credit whatsoever!
A side effect of this is that inward migrants are being sucked into our already needlessly struggling community faster than the existing unfit for purpose infrastructure can reasonably absorb them, as the regular black alert overloads at Treliske and rapidly increasing traffic chaos testify beyond reasonable doubt.
In Falmouth the sheer number of student houses alone is robbing our council of serious sums of council tax income while local families are finding it ever more difficult to find homes in their own home town; I put it to you in the strongest possible terms that it cannot be a healthy situation, least of all for your re-election prospects.
To clarify, Cornish Solidarity is not against inward migrants per se, but we are most certainly opposed to the unreasonable pressures their relentless arrival is placing on us all. We want to see a rethink of mass hyper-development towards sustainable organic development majoring on local need, quality construction and the smooth integration of manageable numbers of incomers, in sync with, rather than as presently in advance of, infrastructure improvements, to accommodate their needs without unacceptable disruption to existing residents.
Cornish Solidarity puts it to you that both you and Cornwall Council’s first duty of care MUST be to your constituents and Cornwall Council’s council taxpayers, rather than to greedy corporate carnivores who buy influence via political patronage, to rampage through our Duchy, spreading an avalanche of concrete on our green fields without let, hindrance or any responsibility for the inevitable consequences that are becoming daily more evident.
Enough is Enough!
Your response to these points will be appreciated at your earliest convenience.
Yours sincerely
Kevin Bennetts
Gwennap
01209 862783
Meanwhile, an important link from Illogan residents:
www.facebook.com/events/172209254213468/
And this video from St. Ives:
www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=ZMe_oWxdmw8&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR0_Iep3ON0BJtSF6-Xe3-TcFCo3A9gvtVpUTrfhoyeWlO8EPB6dmUW_HOI
Finally, some messages for our growth-obsessed politicians:
www.ted.com/talks/kate_raworth_a_healthy_economy_should_be_designed_to_thrive_not_grow?language=en&utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare&fbclid=IwAR3dEy1MekcTXY6vrq6IjR12zKhTL5fN5TAXfvtZQs7QjlgQQOA9XlUks5c