Just a quick post to say that planning permission was granted at yesterday’s planning review committee with an extra condition that lighting be installed on the access route – this was made a grampian condition meaning that if it can’t be met (e.g. if the landowner of the access route, the county council in this case, refuses to allow lighting) then the permission will fall.  I chaired the meeting and it passed off without any bad behaviour at all.

I would say more about the meeting but I have been subjected to an extremely foul email today from one of the Governors of East Oxford Primary School so I want to deal with that first. It contained:

“…Tony was seated at the head of the table, a place/position which he should not have taken, especially from what he did early by making such statements. Everything looked pre-planned beautifully. How was he even allowed in the room is beyond me? … Furthermore I must add how ashamed I am, that I have to live in a city, where people (councillors) like these have powers, and misuse them however they please. Undermining the greater good in our communities, especially for our school. Dismissing what’s important and siding with something that would do more harm than good. Personally I don’t know how they got their seats in the first place, or why they gave the go ahead on such an important matter, obviously this was an under hand job, maybe bribery was used?…

<name removed by me> (parent governor E.O.P.S)“

I won’t name the sender here but the email went to all 48 members of Oxford City Council so I guess it will get out eventually.  It really is not nice being accused of accepting a bribe and I must say, if the sender had been listening at the meeting the sender would have noticed that I recorded an abstention on the vote.  There was one other abstention, one against and 6 in favour of the application so it would have been granted however I voted and I don’t think anyone can reasonably accuse me of taking sides – I ran the meeting fairly and objectively as I hope those present will testify!

The meeting was not helped either by the Oxford Mail publishing an inflammatory story that same day that tried to pitch me against the residents by using a photo of Union Street onto which I had been superimposed.  I consider that photo to have been extremely misleading and unhelpful to the planning process.  If you click the picture here to enlarge it you’ll see around the border of my head how badly the journalists have pasted my image onto the scene.