silverlands
action campaign
Newsletter 8 11 February 2002
Friday Night Candle Lit Vigils Continue
Every Friday night 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. outside the
entrance to Silverlands. Please support
if you can, every person counts. Also
this is where you are guaranteed to find out the latest news and
information. See you there.
Apologies
to the Council!
In the last
newsletter we criticised the council for not doing anything about the lack of
planning permission for the fence erected around Silverlands (a grade 2 listed
building). We have subsequently been
told that government departments enjoy Crown Immunity and therefore they don’t
need planning permission. It would
appear that whilst there will be situations where Crown Immunity is
appropriate, it is wholly inappropriate for government departments to enjoy
universal Crown Immunity. There has to
be accountability and constraint. Sorry
council.
The
Key Date
In the last week we have learnt that the Wolvercote
clinic has to vacate its current site at Epsom by the 30th April
2002. In the event that an alternative
site is not ready or has not been identified we don’t know what will
happen. In an interview on radio 4
earlier this week Donald Findlater, the manager of the Wolvercote clinic
suggested that there is no contingency plan in place. Local councillors who met with Home Office officials recently
were given the impression that there were alternate contingency plans in place
depending whether there was a short or long term gap before the premises were
ready for occupation. Who knows what
the true picture is!
Philip
Hammond MP
Our local MP, Philip
Hammond had a meeting with Tony Raban and Eithne Wallis form the Home Office on
the 7th February to discuss the decision making process. Key points - 1) Home Office weeks away from
a decision, 2) if Silverlands is chosen then they (HO) will fully comply with
all planning and listed building consents, 3) HO would make no commitments as
to what information on their decision making process they would make public.
Silverlands
on the Radio & in the Media
·
The campaign team
were interviewed as part of the Radio 4 programme File on 4 broadcast on
Tuesday 5th & Sunday 10th February.
·
Radio 4 have also
recorded an article for their PM Programme broadcast on 11th
February
·
Contact has also been made regarding a programme
for the You & Yours radio programme also on Radio 4.
·
There is also an
Esther Ranzen TV programme in the pipeline, which campaign representatives will
be inputting to.
Rightly the media
focus on the need for treatment is increasing.
The campaign doesn’t question the need for treatment. The issue as far as we are concerned is that
facilities of this nature should not be located in residential areas and that
due process must be followed when planning such facilities, including proper
consultation.
Fund
Raising Pledges
Thank you to everyone who has contributed to the fighting fund, individuals and companies. As things currently stand we don’t know what level of funds we will need going forward. If things go our way then we won’t need any more. If things don’t go our way then we will need a considerable amount of money very quickly to mount a legal challenge. In the event that the latter situation occurs it will be immensely helpful for us to have pledges of financial support that we can call on without delay. Please call the hotline now on 07960 828113 and make a pledge to the fighting fund.
Monitoring Site Traffic
A sturdy core of 10 have been working very hard at maintaining a presence
at the entrance to Silverlands to monitor site traffic & feed back
information on activity. We also need
to be able to alert the council if materials other than for the basic fabric
are being delivered to the site.
Information recently gleaned includes the fact that up to 40 workmen are
on site on any given day including electricians from Seeboard & that
deliveries of building materials by Jewson are pretty much constant.
The feedback from the team is a vital source of information for the
campaign. The team need more
help/volunteers with the monitoring.
Even if you can only spare an hour a week please help. Phone us now at the number below.
Access to email?
If you have access to email let us have your details & we will be
able to add you to our distribution list for any breaking news.
Contact Us At:
Silverlands Action
Campaign, Moorewell House, Lyne Lane, Lyne, KT16 0AJ
By phone - hotline
07960 828113 By Fax 01932 874547
e.mail to silverlandsgroup@hotmail.com Internet -
WWW.chertsey.org.uk/silverlandsgroup
Everything in this newsletter is provided in good faith and we accept no
responsibility for any inaccuracies in any information provided to us in good
faith. If we have made any statement which is incorrect in any way please
contact us and we will correct it as soon as possible.