Save Our Sidmouth

Category Archives: East Devon Issues


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Examination in Public of EDDC’s Local Plan..some highlights from this week’s hearings

The Climate Change hearing yesterday (Thursday 27th Feb) is summarised here: http://eastdevonalliance.org/2014/02/28/an-inspector-calls-on-climate-change-policy-at-eddc/

Today’s session was on Open Space, Leisure and Community Facilities. Interestingly, of the seven developer or development-related organisations that had registered to speak only one turned up! So we were all done by 11.0am and Mr Thickett,the Inspector, wished us all a good weekend.

The main reason for going for some members of the public, was to ensure that it is the revised version of the Open Space Study that will be the reference, and not the OSS 2012 version. This seemed to have been taken on board, although some observers were not much impressed by Graeme Thompson’s performance. Readers of this blog will recall that Peter Whitfield of Save our Sidmouth was originally promised that the wrong Byes classification would be corrected at the October Development Management Committee(DMC). But it then became part of a much larger revision process which has yet to be completed and put to DMC for ratification. Mr Whitfield says, “We shall need to be wary in the meantime of any attempts to encroach on Parks and Recreation Grounds, or any of the five other classifications of open space in which Sidmouth has a deficiency against standards, by any planning applications.”

There were strong representations from Seaton on the issue of built leisure facilities by Peter Gilpin of Leisure East Devon (LED), and Mr D Morgan, a psychologist, who highlighted the importance of open space and leisure facilities for mental health and well being. These town-specific issues will be raised again when Seaton comes up for examination.


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Who speaks for Sidmouth and the Sid Valley?

Who on EDDC represents Sidmouth and the Sid Valley?

At last night’s shameful council meeting it seemed to be all down to Cllr Graham Troman. He was the only local councillor to speak up for fuller information on relocation costs. And the only one to vote for a motion to pause the headlong rush to relocate to Skypark, pending another survey of the existing Knowle offices.

None of the other Sid Valley councillors-all Tories -seem to have grasped the radical consequences for the area of the move from Knowle, linked as it is with the allocation of a 12.5 acre business park at Sidford.

They ignored eloquent appeals from a succession of their constituents at question time, and sat silent when one of the most important decisions in a generation was slipped through.

Cllr Chris Wale was an exception. His sycophantic praise of all the Leadership’s wondrous works seemed to have blinded him to the Leadership’s own admission that Sidmouth’s economy will be harmed (while other parts of the district will benefit) by the move from Knowle.

Cllrs Newth, Sullivan, Drew, Kerridge and Hughes appear to be similarly afflicted…or is something else going on?

Voters will want to know.


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Council Leader says EDDC will be ‘engaging with customers and stakeholders’ on office relocation.

There was certainly no sign of that intention at last night’s meeting, with the Leadership’s total dismissiveness of the 50 or so ‘customers and stakeholders’ present. Not one of their courteous questions received an answer. (Ron Roberts’ question was published on our website yesterday. More to follow.)
EDDC’s version of last night’s events, which omits to mention the lack of debate from most Councillors who voted, was issued today by the District Council’s Communications and Affairs Manager, Lisa Mansell:

’27 February 2014

Further research into the viability of the council’s office relocation to SkyPark was given the go ahead by full council last night (26 February).

Council officers will now enter a further evaluation and negotiation phase with the preferred option of SkyPark. A report outlining whether the council should commit funding to the new headquarters is expected to be presented to cabinet and full council in July.

Councillor Paul Diviani, leader of East Devon District Council, said:

“Now we have full council’s approval to enter further negotiation with the preferred option of SkyPark we can focus our attention solely on this site.

“SkyPark is firmly on East Devon soil and the location exemplifies the council’s commitment to the Growth Point – this is an exciting emerging employment and commercial development locations in the district which will help East Devon keep its promise to deliver a thriving, competitive local economy with quality jobs.

“As part of the office relocation we will be engaging with customers and stakeholders to ask them what particular services they would like to see provided elsewhere – to a greater degree than they already are if we press the button and decide to move to SkyPark.”

A marketing exercise for Knowle and Manstone will now also get underway, as well as an investigation into options on re-provision of business space to succeed East Devon Business Centre. This follows full council’s decision to offer the council’s Heathpark site for redevelopment.

Capital receipts from Knowle, Manstone and Heathpark will be invested in the new headquarters so that the council keeps its commitment not to place any extra burden on Council Tax payers.

Back in November, cabinet shortlisted five out of 15 possible sites for new office accommodation. These were Cranbrook town centre, SkyPark, two sites on Heathpark in Honiton and Clyst House at Winslade Park. Apart from the two sites in Honiton, all other options were to the west of the district. Cabinet asked for further evaluation of these locations, including site visits, further work with developers and agents, an equality analysis, expert spatial analysis and additional intelligence. In January the Office Accommodation Member Executive Group considered the options – along with the option to stay at Knowle – and the top two scoring locations were presented to cabinet. These were SkyPark and Clyst House, Winslade Park.

Cabinet took the decision on 5 February to go with SkyPark.

If cabinet and full council commit funding to the new headquarters in the summer it is likely that the council would relocate towards the end of 2016.’