Green Party Councillor and Thanet South General Election Candidate
Ian Driver has denounced TDCs Labour Cabinet as “Parkway Prats”. His comment follows
their recent decision to support Kent County Council’s plans for a £14million
Parkway Station at rural Cliffsend after having strongly opposed the idea during the
last Council elections in 2011.
Said Driver “I am flabbergasted by the jaw-dropping scale
of Thanet Labour’s hypocrisy. In 2011 they sought election on a manifesto commitment
to “support moves to reduce the
travel time to London but not at the expense and environmental damage of a new Parkway
Station”.
In
an article on Thanet Labour Party’s blog site dated 24 April 2011, Richard
Nicholson the current Deputy Leader of the Council said “are we expected to
believe that this (Parkway Station) is a good use of public money?... this
(Parkway Station) will create an enormous parking need on green land and more
traffic snarl ups especially at peak times….This Parkway is not justified nor
needed”. On 20th January 2015
the same Richard Nicholson agreed “to note the current position with regard to
progress on the Thanet Parkway Station and confirmed support for the
project”. I wonder why he has
changed his mind?
Writing
on the Thanet Labour Blog site on 3 May 2011, just 2 days before the council
election Councillor Clive Hart, said “we’ve outlined our continued support
for shortening travel times to London. However, Thanet Labour is always mindful
of our local environment as a Parkway station with a huge car park, just doesn’t
make economic sense”
But
on becoming Leader of the Council just one year later Hart, who also assumed responsibility
for economic development, quickly changed his mind about the Parkway Station.
He engaged in secretive discussions with Kent County Council, Dover and
Canterbury Councils and the Kent and Medway Local Economic Partnership which resulted in the publication, in early 2013, of Unlocking the Potential: Going for Growth – Kent and Medway’s Growth Plan,
which supported the development of a Ramsgate Parkway Station. I wonder why
Hart, like Nicholson also changed his mind? Hart was later replaced as Leader
by Iris Johnston who enthusiastically supports, the Parkway Station plan.
I wonder why she has changed her mind?
I am
amazed that Thanet Labour has never had the honesty and
decency to tell the voters that they have changed their mind about a key
manifesto pledge? It’s astonishing that a modern political party which claims to
listen to the people, should make false promises to the voters of Thanet and when
safely elected and in charge deceitfully go back on their word. But there again, as I explained in a previous
post, this is not the first time Thanet Labour have lied to and duped the
voters. They did exactly the same thing when they
recently allowed the building of houses on the EKO site at New Haine Road,
after having said in their 2011 manifesto they would oppose developments on green field sites. Labour-led
Thanet Council has now demonstrated on at least 2 occasions that when it comes
to promises to the voters they are liars and hypocrites. Saying one thing and
doing totally the opposite. This is especially worrying because the promises
they have broken were all about protecting Thanet’s environment which, has the
draft local plan shows, is under serious threat of overdevelopment. A party as dishonest
and deceitful as this is surely not fit
for public office! Ranting
aside, I share many of the reservations about the environmental impact of
a
Thanet Parkway station which were raised by the Labour Party in 2011. I am
also extremely worried that the development of a Ramsgate Parkway station will
be a magnet for developers to embark upon
massive housebuilding programmes around rural Cliffsend which, until we have a local plan in place in 2017, will
be legally irresistible.Finally
in 2011 Richard Nicholson warned that the development of the Parkway station
might threaten the continued existence Ramsgate station. It’s interesting to note that Labour
Parliamentary hopeful Will Scobie also thinks that Ramsgate station’s future is
questionable. Just over a year ago the Thanet Gazette reported that
“COUNTY Councillor
Will Scobie has questioned the need to refurbish Ramsgate rail station when
there is the possibility of a new station being built on the isle Cllr Scobie,
who is also the Labour prospective parliamentary candidate for South Thanet,
said: "I am fully supportive of these plans as long as Ramsgate station
continues to be used. The lack of consultation about the proposed new Thanet
Parkway station concerns me. If that goes ahead do we need to spend £400,000
improving a station that will decline in use?”
Surely if Ramsgate
station, which saw the arrival and departure of more than one million
passengers” last year, is to be
protected then the Parkway station must be opposed. No ifs, buts or maybes.
Sadly the Parkway
Prats who make up the Council’s Cabinet and aspire to represent the town in
Parliament don’t’ see it this way!
I will be posting
soon of the environmental implications of the Parkway Station
Here's something to do with Parks and Prats
So Labour wants Parkway Station and no Airport.
ReplyDeleteBut public wants Parkway Station only if there is an Airport.
This does not suprise me. These two faced powers that be, have been trying to make this happen for decades. From the harrasment of Haine rd homeowners and the toppling of haine hospital. They want a MaSsIvE estate from wwx to sandwich nature reserve. The building of the industrial estate. The thousands of homes to be built with no jobs 12, 000 homes with say two people in each...24, 000 people and the so called empty promise of 5000 jobs still leaves 19, 000 more out of work. The airport run so it didnt earn by the same people who own it now just under a different name. This station is to allow for this huge estate they plan to have happen. Now with the influx of homes to be built for commuters all over our green/brown fields with no care of the lack of water we are already suffering with or killing off of the wildlife or the lack of farming. I have no idea how to get these two faced long term planners out. But im glad we have you to show us all exactly what we need to know. X
ReplyDeleteWell said Ian and 19:09 and even Michael's blog is biased towards incompetent Thanet Labour.
ReplyDeleteThe idiots wanted night flights then changed their minds and now want a Parkway rail station without the airport it was intended for.
We can do without Thanet Labour.
Is Richard Nicholson standing again? He doesn't seem to be? And why has Everitt not resigned after the Port and Pavillion fiasco?
ReplyDelete19:09 is right except nobody wanted the airport or a Parkway. We want our trains stations as they are and a Parkway is complete waste of tax. Are we really paying KCC civil servants to build a Parkway without an airport and with 3 main train stations nearby? And wasn't it more than £14M in tax provided by DofT? Have KCc creamed off some of the £20M for themsleves?
ReplyDeleteWill candidates be standing as doublehatters for TDC etc? If so they should be avoided or at least refuse one of the salaries...
ReplyDeleteImagine what £14M could be spent on instead of a white elephant Parkway. It looks like KCC have got the grant and are looking just to spend it even though the airport is closed. Do Private Eye know about this?
ReplyDeleteRegarding 09:31 and the "waste of tax" we see it all over Thanet by KCC in their never ending road building programme at vast expense, covering quality farmland, ruining the once tranquil and scenic views, and all for what? Where we once had a handful of narrow but straight and direct main roads we now have massively wide structures snaking around up and down and around like the plans were done by some drunkard, or the contractor rubbing his hands together with glee at the millions he would be paid for the acres of tarmac. We are even paying to make the old Roman straight routes like from Lord of the Manor to the Prospect, and the road past Pegwell Bay less attractive to stop people using them such is the "success" of the new roads. The Poor Hole Lane widening works costing millions were said to help create up to 5000 jobs, it is utter nonsense. I suspect a self perpetuating concreting machine is running out of control which consists of well-connected contractors pushing for more and more lucrative public sector work on the one hand, and "procurement" managers and Highway planners in KCC justifying their salaries by always having new schemes to work up, consult on, and oversee. Between the two of them they will spend all the public's money and build on all the land they can, because that is how they earn a living. Regrettably around Thanet there seem to very few Councillors with the wit and the will to put a stop to it. They are guilty of both sins, the destruction of the environment and the enormous waste of public money. Then the leaders of KCC stand up saying they're short of cash and need to make savings. Doesn't the left hand know what the right hand is doing?
ReplyDeleteWhat's happening with your TDC secrecy gagging order and court costs Ian? And are the Wetherspoon Pavillion contracts public yet they seem to have been signed in secret?
ReplyDelete