Purnell, Hoon and the Longdendale Bypass - multiple FAIL

Amidst all this talk of reinstated road plans and re-electing politicians and parties, we'd like to contrast fantasy with reality. So here's a homage to failblog - and a re-hash of an image we used once before in a different way, updated to remind readers of the fate of Geoff Hoon, James Purnell and the Longdendale Bypass

Councillors Wilcox, Wilkinson & 'Glossop Eastlands' - no thanks!

Although following yesterday's news we're hopefully now entering a different phase in the future of this blog, we have a few shots left to fire before we shut up shop.

You may remember our article a few weeks ago about how Derbyshire County Councillors Wilcox and Wilkinson had written to the Transport Secretary of State Geoff Who?/Hoon calling for the Public Inquiry to be halted and a new one reconvened. Now hold onto your immediate thoughts for one second and bear with us...

Stalwart Objector John Hall promptly issued a Freedom of Information request to obtain said letter, and it can be viewed here. Key amongst the bleatings of Potato-Head Wilkinson and Media-Tart Wilcox was their pointing out to Hoon that the bypass is important in the "economic regeneration of East Manchester". Well oh dear, what a shame the bypass has hit the brakes then! I envisage that most people who live in the area would like it to remain completely unlike Manchester - neither East, West, North nor South - and we like it that way. As we've said before, one only has to look around Glossopdale to see what havoc has been wrought by the Borough Council trying to transform it into something it isn't, without a word of complaint from the area's County Councillors. These two chimps may have wet dreams about warehouses but we'd like to offer them a one way ticket to Beswick...

Now then, when you read the first paragraph you were probably marvelling at the precognitive powers of Wilkinson/Wilcox in calling for at least half of what actually happened yesterday all the way back in February. We're more cynical than that. Unlike most of the area's other politicians, they haven't staked their reputations (unwittingly or otherwise) too publicly on the Bypass. All the better for them then to take a new stance and outflank the Bypass mob, no doubt because they heard one or two things on the grapevine about the road's chances. Savvy & cynical bastards indeed.

Hoongate: Who? is fooling Who - enter 'Bronze' Adonis...

The first document submitted by the Highways Agency to the Public Inquiry in nearly 6 months appeared in the last couple days on the Persona Website. 

It's a letter from the Department for Transport to the Planning Inspectorate (opens PDF), ostensibly concerning a complaint from the stalwart Objector John Hall about Geoff Hoon's meeting with pro-Bypass politicians last November. Whilst this is a rather pedestrian and brief document, it does contain a very interesting new development. 

In a highly suspicious move, the letter reveals that the ultimate decision maker on the Bypass project will be the Transport Minister, Baron Andrew 'Bronze' Adonis rather than Who?/Hoon. There are several apparently significant implications in this chess move.

Firstly, that Hoon/Who? doesn't want to be tarnished with making a decision (whatever that may be), and also that he's been rattled by the criticism coming his way that he's usurped the Inquiry with the 'Hoongate' meeting. John Hall has touched a raw nerve here.

Secondly, who (Who?) better to make a decision than an unelected bureaucrat like Adonis? It can't ruin his career because he's not - and never has been - an elected politician. He climbed the greasy pole as one of Tony Blair's policy wonks, after repeatedly failing to become an MP (for the Liberal Democrats!).

Thirdly, Levitt, Purnell and Oldham must be feeling pretty bloody stupid and duped by Hoon's chess move here. They even posed for photos with him for Christ's sake!

Lastly, after the 4NW decision last week, will Adonis agree to meet with Levitt and Purnell? If Levitt went on his own, it'd look like a Gilbert and George convention, increasing the comedic possibilities. Perhaps the best we can hope for is that they'll pose for photos which will result in another in our 'lolprat' series.

More news as we get it.

Roger Wilkinson - the potato-headed cuckoo in the Peak District's nest

The Buxton Advertiser has published what is presumably a press release for the Glossop South Derbyshire County Councillor Roger Wilkinson, who has written to Geoff Who? calling for the current Public Inquiry to be stopped, and a new one to commence following consultation. 

This is breaking new ground, as up until now, it has been Tameside politicians that have been content to urge the Highways Agency to 'hurry up'.  But Wilkinson and the notorious media-tart Councillor Dave Wilcox have now called for a new consultation, as well as a new Inquiry. Curiously, they are using the language of some of the opposition - that the facts on the ground have changed, and that means that if the plans have changed, then the whole process must start afresh. And they are clearly aware that the way the current PI process as been conducted will have legal implications too - "if an attempt is made to simply restart the old inquiry it is almost certain we will be in judicial review and further delay territory".

They've no doubt got their eye on the (now) Planning Reform Act, as we'd predicted in a blog late last year. No doubt they'd want the Bypass to be named as a 'National Infrastructure Project', meaning it would almost certainly be waved through without any kind of scrutiny at all. Wilkinson hints at this - "In the letter to Mr Hoon, a former Derbyshire Euro MP, the councillors have stressed the importance of the A628 bypass in regenerating East Manchester and Glossopdale" - this is coded language for their desire to see Glossopdale and Longdendale to become an enlarged retail strip and warehousing facility, as is already in evidence at Rossington Park in Hadfield. 

Of course, it's never been a secret that Derbyshire County Council are fully behind the bypass. But Wilkinson is a curiosity - he's a cuckoo in the nest of the Peak District National Park Authority -  as a body, they are opposed to the Bypass, but Wilkinson is a member. 

And perhaps some other kind of strange politics are in evidence here? The photo that accompanies the article shows Derbyshire County Councillor Wilkinson stood next to one of Longdendale Siege's 'Dick Turpin' roadsigns inTameside Lancashire, with a Manchester A-Z in his hands. Is he a stooge for Tameside, opening up a new front? Why should he care about regenerating East Manchester - Tameside's backyard? We think the answer is because Glossop's very own Mr Potato Head wants the type of regeneration pioneered by Tameside and Manchester City Council in the High Peak. I wonder what his 'ground swell of local opinion' - an abstract and unquantifiable concept if ever there was one - would think about that?

**UPDATE, 11th February 2009: both the Glossop and Tameside Advertiser are now running the article.

Tom Levitt, Geoff Hoon and the logic of capitalism

As you'll see in the above extract from the House of Commons debate on Heathrow this Wednesday, Tom Levitt did his duty and supported Geoff Who?, as he had done previously in the local press. We'll regurgitate Hansard below in case you'd prefer to see the words spoken:

Levitt: Does my right hon. Friend agree that perhaps the most polluting and wasteful practice by Heathrow is stacking, in which aeroplanes have to wait to come into land? That is because the runways are used at 99 per cent. capacity, which causes problems with the reliability of services. Is it not the case that the first impact of a third runway would be to reduce carbon emissions through the reduction and even abolition of stacking?

Hoon: My hon. Friend makes an excellent point and one that was completely ignored by the hon. Lady. At any given time, there can be as many as four stacks of aircraft waiting to land. The average delay at Heathrow—caused by the capacity problems—is some 19 minutes, and some aircraft are delayed for far longer. Therefore it is necessary to address the question of capacity, in carbon terms as much as for any other reason.

The logic used is the same as used by the proponents of the Longdendale Bypass, which of course includes Levitt. That congestion - be it in the air or on the roads - causes pollution (in this case CO2 emissions) and the best way to treat this is by increasing capacity. The perverse and contradictory logic on display is their worldview turned on its head. They support capitalism, and support the infinite growth it seeks. But in this case, they seek to cloak that logic in the clothes of environmentalism. The truth is that expanding capacity will simply serve to increase demand - more planes in the air (or cars on the road) equals more pollution. 

Cloth-eared 'Who?' declares war, again...

Is anyone actually surprised that Geoff Who? yesterday approved plans for a third runway at Heathrow? Particularly given that the Guardian reports that he regards climate change as "a load of tree-hugging hoolah" (a new slogan for our blog). And can anyone now doubt exactly what's in store for Longdendale, at least as long as this Government is in charge of Transport policy? 

Hoon wants a war: a war on the environment to match his ruthless decision to join in the slaughter in Iraq and Afghanistan. So let's give him one. We'll need old tactics, and also new ones. Let's have less of the ridiculous tactics of self-imposed imprisonment that were in evidence at Manchester Airport the other night. and may well be used at Heathrow tomorrow now that the details are public. Let's also drop the Liberal cant about non-violence - self-defence is always justifiable & in war there are always casualties. Individual tactics should not be adopted as wholesale strategy, unless we want to lose. Liberal hand-wringing about damage to property must be dismissed - this type of action is needed, and is a justifiable response when one considers the Government is going to demolish 700 homes and remove 10,000 people from Sipson and the surrounding area. Sipson is BAA's Lidice. We won't allow it.

Furthermore, every action in opposition to unnecessary infrastructure development now has a new reason to thrive. The government may have radicalised a whole section of society, allowing them to develop a more cogent and realistic analysis of the problems we face and develop suitable responses which do not echo the redundant reformist measures of old.

Hoongate part 3: what was said to Geoff Who?

And now here's the news you needed to make you chuck up your Xmas dinner. We have some answers about what took place at the 'Hoongate' meeting last month. The implications for the future of this road scheme are massive.

Keen readers of the local press may have noticed a press release from Friends of the Peak District over the past week or so. Along with the Campaign for National Parks, they have demanded to know how alternatives have been rejected (as was the line from Tom Levitt) when the Public Inquiry has not yet had chance to examine them, and they also accuse Geoff Who? of breaking the Governments Ministerial Code by 'jumping the gun'.

But now leading Objector John Hall has passed to us notes from the Hoongate meeting, which can be viewed here. They reveal the 'official' version of events, which we'll now try to elucidate.

Firstly, it's clear from the text that Tom Levitt has shot his bolt by stating all the guff about the Glossop Spur. For the DfT officials, the Spur is clearly so unimportant that it's not even appeared in the notes. As usual, Levitt makes a complete fool of himself. 

The main complaint begins in paragraph 5, where Roy Oldham makes it clear that the big problem for the pro-road lobbyists is the cost escalation. Oldham believes the estimated costs are too high when compared with other schemes, although it was pointed out to him by Highways Agency officials present that the cheaper schemes he used as an example are not really comparable, which shows how ignorant he is. 

Hoon then offered to turn the Inquiry process on it's head - paragraph 6 says that he offered to detrunk the existing road - this demonstrates that he is clearly partial and implicated now in this whole mucky, cruddy business. The current proposals for the bypass envisage that detrunking - a shifting of responsibility for the road from the Highways Agency to the Local Authorities - would take place after the bypass had been built. The fact that the A628 and A57 are a Trunk road is also one of the principle reasons thrown up by the pro-road lobby as to why a lorry ban is not possible. 

So we can only assume that Hoon's offer to detrunk the road now means that a Lorry Ban is more possible now than it has ever been. If it's that easy to remove problems, then there's no excuse not to try it. 

The implication of Hoon's offer is that if the responsibility for the road is handed to local authorities, then they can also have the responsibility for funding and constructing a bypass. Whether or not this makes a bypass more or less likely is a point we'll surely return to if Hoon's offer is serious. 

In paragraph 7, Purnell discounts alternative routes, after Hoon asked for views on them. This makes it clear that Hoon is asking the opinion of politicians before the case for alternatives have been put to the Inquiry, and before Hoon's agency - the Highways Agency - have rebutted any evidence put before them for alternative routes.

And in paragraph 8, Hoon is said to be 'awaiting formal advice from the relevant regional authorities before making a decision and when he had received that in the coming weeks he would be considering the best way forward'. 

With the release of this news, John Watson the Inquiry Inspector must wonder exactly what his role is. It's clear now for all to see that the key decisions are being made outside the Inquiry, and the politicians are completely brazen about it. Not only are the Highways Agency wasting the time and money of the public with their delaying tactics and not only is the Public Inquiry clearly a complete sham, but the politicians have no intention of even listening to the alternative point of view. 

That's fine - it confirms what we knew all along: they want a road, not alternatives.

But they need to be clear about the implications of making such aggressive moves. If Hoon wants to launch a war on the environment in Glossopdale and Longdendale in the same fashion as he launched the Iraq war - i.e without consultation, without listening to other points of view, in a pre-emptive manner - then he can expect a suitable response. 

Geoff Who? & Purnell - lolprats

In homage to one of our favourite websites, the wonderful icanhascheezburger.com, we present our moderately amusing take on the phenomenon that are the lolcats. 

So here's a challenge. If you know lolcats and you think you can do better than our version above, then email us with suggestions for an alternate caption for this, and any other picture of the pro-bypass protagonists which we can build into a regular series. If you provide (or point us to) the picture and the caption, we will do the rest...

(the above is a picture of Geoff Who? meeting James Purnell at the 'Hoongate' meeting - from Purnell's abortion of a website)

Hoongate part 2 - who said what to Geoff Who?

Since our post last week about the Bypass Cartel's meeting with the Secretary of State for Transport Geoff Hoon, we now have three different sources of info about what was said. It's time to compare and contrast and form some conclusions.

Firstly, the article in the Advertiser, and a classic Oldhamism from Roy:

"Clearly he (Mr Hoon) can’t support it as he is the final arbitrator but I am hopeful that what we heard is that he understands what our problems and our needs are."

Arbiter Roy, that's the word you're after. Anyway, Levitt didn't get a look in on this article and for a change, Oldham is diplomatic, making it clear that Hoon is 'supposed' to be impartial. 

Then we have the article in the Glossop Chronicle, which also quotes Oldham at the Longdendale and Hattersley District Assembly, and Levitt's remarks on what was discussed. Leaving aside some of the more revealing and juicy quotes for future articles, the impression it gives is that the delegation 'made their case' to Hoon, but hinting that some kind of reassurance was given, Levitt is quoted thus:

"We left the meeting feeling far happier than when we went in"

Now set aside visions of a meeting along the lines of the ones Roy Oldham used to hold with his friends Tom Pendry and Owen Oyston and a bevvy of young women for one moment! This suggests Hoon gave them some kind of hope that the road will be built, come what may.

But the clincher is another source. Quoted by Virtual Glossop, it's from a newsletter sent by Levitt to Party supporters. We'll quote it in full:

Bypass Talks Win New Momentum

The new Transport Secretary, Geoff Hoon, met local MPs Tom Levitt and James Purnell with Tameside Council Leader Roy Oldham last week. The meeting was called to try to get the road plans for the A628 / A57 back on track after the public enquiry ran into technical problems.

“A number of ways forward were discussed,” said Tom, “and some were ruled out. For example, local politicians and the Highways Agency agreed that there was no credible alternative route for the road.” Tom said that Glossop’s economic development relied heavily on the bypass and the associated Glossop Spur being built together. Geoff Hoon, who was our Euro-MEP until 1994, knows the area. He said that officials would explore options to bring the plans back on course quickly.

Levitt likes to portray himself as having all kinds of access at all kinds of levels of government and no doubt this news is more than a little bit of self-aggrandisement. But then we have the mixed messages about 'ways forward' being 'ruled out'. Who is ruling what out? Is it Hoon (previously known as 'Geoff Who' by the press during the attack on Iraq)? If so, it's none of his business, as Roy Oldham was keen to make clear at the Longdendale DA. 

So is Levitt going out on a limb, out of desperation for his more than likely battering at the next General Election? Or did this very cosy meeting really agree a way forward? It should be clear that if objectors request to met him and are rebuffed, then he clearly showing favouritism and bias.

To try to get to the bottom of the matter, leading Objector John Hall sent a Freedom of Information request to Hoon on 26th November:

The press releases today 26th November 2008 indicate your meeting with a delegation of TMBC Councillors who seek your approval for the strongly contested ByPass scheme through the Peak District National Park.

To accept this lobbying by those concerned indicates your complicity in showing contempt for the Public Inquiry process and the protocols required under an appointed Public Inquiry Inspector.

Those objecting to this road scheme have had to abide by the PI proceedings in presenting their evidence under the requirements of the Inquiry, and then being subjected to any cross examinations required by any Supporters of this ByPass.

The gates have been opened through your acceptance of this "organised delegation" who have been allowed to submit their support of the scheme directly to yourself, thereby showing contempt for the present Public Inquiry, the Inspector administrating the proceedings, and all the many objectors.

Because of these lobbying methods adopted through the stated meeting, those involved have avoided being cross examined in a Public Inquiry where their rhetoric and manipulated comments were directly made to yourself, with no recourse whatsoever to the substantial and error free evidence submitted by objectors.

To discriminate in such a flagrant manner Secretary of State, indicates and confirms an existing bias against those objecting through your acceptance of this recent lobbying meeting in London.

The PI Inspector concerned has now lost all credibility in his administrations because of these recent methods adopted by TMBC Councillors and MPs, which indicates a desperation in not being capable of substantiating their rhetoric in an Public Inquiry Open Forum.

I therefore now wish for the implementation of my FOI legislated request to yourself seeking the minutes, agenda, or any matters whatsoever discussed at your recent meeting because I believe extremely serious existing Public Inquiry protocols and procedures have been breached by the DfT whose impartiality has now been totally destroyed through its substantiated complicity with those supporting the ByPass.

We'll keep you informed of any responses as soon as we hear. 

First Watsongate, now Hoongate...

Today brings reports that the local politicians backing the Bypass - Tom Levitt MP, James Purnell MP and Tameside Council Leader Roy Oldham - have met with the new Transport Secretary of State Geoff Hoon to gain assurances about the status of the Longdendale Bypass.

Although the (as yet) unofficial press release from Levitt (originally published on Virtual Glossop - a snapsot of the original article can be viewed here) does not quote Hoon, according to Tom Levitt, there was agreement that "there is no credible alternative to the road" - at least amongst the Highways Agency and local politicians. As the Secretary of State, Hoon is effectively the head of the Highways Agency, so with this proclamation, the Secretary of State is commenting on a scheme that - if it were a Court case - would be sub judice. Breaching that would mean contempt of Court. 

Through their completely unfettered incompetence, Hoon's agency - the Highways Agency - have assured that the 'alternatives' have not even yet had a hearing at the Public Inquiry. What he should be saying is that 'at the Inquiry, the Highways Agency will contend that there are no alternatives, and the Inspector will make a decision based upon the evidence presented by ourselves and Objectors that argue the contrary'. But there's fat chance of such a reasonable pronouncement from this crowd of assorted cretins.

If, as is suggested, the Highways Agency has examined the case for alternatives, why is this information not available to the public at the Inquiry Library or on the website? Why are they not allowing their evidence to be examined prior to challenge by submitting their theories about alternatives now? After all, the alternatives do not form part of their scheme, and are independent of their work/cock-ups so far. Dos this mean the work has not been completed, or is there something else going on?

Despite his past warm words for the Save the Woodhead Tunnel campaign, Tom Levitt is 'speaking with forked tongue'. Because if, as he says, there are 'no credible alternatives' to the bypass, this means he's flashing the campaign a huge V sign. That this twit wants to have his cake and eat it has always been largely undisputed by those who have a realistic appraisal of snake-like politicians. 

And if they are so concerned and passionate about the Bypass, why did James Purnell, Tom Levitt and Roy Oldham fail to schedule their appearances to speak in favour of it at the Inquiry when it was running previously? Because they know full well that their rhetoric and propaganda would be tested to the fullest extent and that they would be exposed as a Cartel in hock to the Road Industry.

Lastly, we hear of reports that at a 'Community Empowerment' event last weekend, Tom Levitt proclaimed that supporters and objectors stood at 50/50 - THIS IS A LIE. For the umpteenth time, we'd like to remind this liar that of the 4239 responses logged by the Highways Agency (available on a list at the Public Inquiry Library), 1469 expressed support, but 2770 have objected. This is 65% against - or using a ratio, 2:1 against. 

We're sure we'll feature much more about this matter very soon...