St Piran's Day in Truro

It was great to escape from County Hall for a couple of hours today, in order to attend the St Piran’s Day celebrations in Truro.

The march was really impressive, involving hundreds of people and numerous local schools. Congratulations to all involved. I hope that other marches and events around Cornwall have also been as well supported.

St Piran's Day Message

In my St Piran’s Day Message, I have challenged political parties active in Cornwall to do more to achieve the “meaningful devolution of political powers to Cornwall.” My statement states:

“Last year, the people of Wales voted overwhelmingly to increase the powers of the Welsh Assembly, and the SNP won a clear majority in the Scottish Parliament. There will therefore be a referendum on Scottish independence in 2014.

“There is clearly a desperate need for a mature, respectful and wide-ranging debate about the future of the whole of the United Kingdom, and how it is governed.

“And surely now is the time to address the unequal constitutional relationships between the various nations and regions of the UK, and to tackle the centralising influence of London and the South East of England.

“It is to be welcomed that some MPs in the North of England are again seeking directly elected regional government for the north.

“But here in Cornwall, even our political integrity and territoriality is under threat, with central government planning to impose a cross-Tamar constituency.”

I have written to the local representatives of the three main London-centred parties, challenging them to follow the lead of Mebyon Kernow in campaigning for greater powers for Cornwall.

The letters note that: “We need to put Cornwall at the heart of the debate about the future governance of the United Kingdom and to achieve the devolution of meaningful devolution of political powers to Cornwall.”

Celebrating St Piran at Perranzabuloe

Alongside many hundreds of people, today I enjoyed the St Piran Play and procession across the dunes near Perranporth. It was great to see so many friends and to celebrate Cornwall's wonderful heritage and culture.

I have uploaded a couple of images to see what a great event it was.

Bodmin Town Council by-election result

MK's Paul Ellis has achieved a very credible third place in today’s by-election in St Mary's Ward. The result was as follows:

Liberal Democrats - 442 (44.4%)
Independent - 213 (21.5%)
Paul Ellis (MK) - 194 (19.6%)
Conservatives - 141 (14.2%)

I am confident that Paul will be a town councillor within 15 months (via the full elections in May 2013).

Well done to Paul on a great result in his first election.

A disgraceful tale of “eco-standard communities” and consultation

In recent days, there has been considerable coverage of the eleven proposed “eco-standard communities,” which were included within the Core Strategy to discover “whether there would be local support.”

One of the proposals is for a stand-alone settlement of over 3,000 new properties in the vicinity of Ruthvoes and Quoit Farms (RTP 9) – positioned between Indian Queens and St Columb.

The land lies mostly in St Columb Parish, but is partly within my home parish of St Enoder and earlier this week, St Enoder Parish Council unanimously objected and pledged to vigorously fight the proposal.

As the Chairman of the Planning Policy Panel, I would like to repeat here what I said at the Parish meeting. It is important that this is in the public domain.

(i) The “eco-standard communities” proposals were not presented to the Planning Policy Advisory Panel for consideration.

(ii) When drafts of the various discussion papers (which form part of the present Core Strategy consultation) were distributed to all councillors for comment, they did not include the proposed “eco-standard” areas.

(iii) The proposed “eco-standard” areas were added into the documentation after the councillors had commented and they were not informed of this fact. They were allowed no option to object to their inclusion within the consultation.

Put bluntly, officers at Cornwall Council bypassed the democratic process. What I said, when I received the consultation documents and discovered the additions, is not printable.

The consultation document states that: “The site areas identified were submitted by a third party and are not necessarily supported by Cornwall Council. However, the Council is keen to understand whether there would be local support, in principle, to develop these sites as new eco-communities.”

It is not true that the land in question has been put forward by a third party. Ruthvoes Farm and Quoit Farm are both County Farms, owned by Cornwall Council. It is also the case that the tenants of these County Farms were not informed that their holdings had been included within the consultation document until Monday 27th February – some seven weeks after the start of the consultation.

I am extremely angry about this situation, I am making serious representations on this matter, and I was pleased to be able to produce a strong objection on behalf of St Enoder Parish Council.

The “eco-standard communities” proposals are unacceptable, for a host of reasons, which I may outline in more detail in the future.

It is my view that these proposals should all be withdrawn as a consequence of the machinations of Cornwall Council and the fact that the proposals make no sense whatsoever.