Councillors COULD have made decision over controversial Calderdale waste incinerator
Plus, worst possible start to season for Halifax Town
Hello and welcome to The Calderdale Lead!
I hope you’ve all had a good weekend so far whatever you’ve been up to.
In today’s edition, my colleague John Greenwood has the latest on the long-running saga of a controversial waste incinerator in the borough.
Plus, Halifax Town made the worst possible start to their National League campaign, losing 3-0 away at Braintree Town. We’ve got reaction from manager Adam Lakeland below.
So, on with the news…
Town hall boss admits councillors could have had say over controversial incinerator
By John Greenwood
Senior councillors could have made a decision over a controversial permit application allowing a company to operate an incinerator all along.
Calder Valley Skip Hire needs the crucial environmental permit to be allowed to operate a small waste incineration plant (SWIP) at its Belmont, Sowerby Bridge site.
The incinerator is bitterly opposed by residents, councillors and MPs worried about potential impacts on health.
The company has planning permission – granted some years ago on appeal to the Planning Inspectorate after Calderdale Council had refused permission – but must have the permit, a decision which lays with councils, to actually operate it.
Senior councillors have come in for criticism because a decision late last year to grant a permit, subject to conditions, was granted by council officers under delegated powers.
Over the past year objectors to the incinerator have raised the issue in question time sessions at meetings of the council’s Cabinet and at meetings of the full council.
They referenced previous applications made by the company for a permit to operate an incinerator, including at a different site, being decided by Cabinet members not officers.
Earlier this year Place Scrutiny Board councillors urged Cabinet to ensure members had a bigger say in where such decisions were taken, recommending changes to the council’s constitution to that effect.
And after delays consulting the constitution, it has been confirmed they could do this all along.
Leader of the Council, Coun Jane Scullion, said the council’s legal team had scoured the authority’s constitution to ensure a change proposed by the scrutiny councillors was appropriate and within legal limitations of the regulations and legislation governing the permits.
She said this showed the ability for decisions delegated to officers to be taken by elected members already exists and therefore Cabinet members did not consider formal amendment to the constitution needed to be made.
It did not guarantee decisions would ultimately be taken by councillors.
“The provision to ask and to move things up and down the scheme of delegation exists.
“It doesn’t automatically mean that it will be taken precisely where an objector or a scrutiny member wishes it to be taken,” said Coun Scullion.
The statement has not impressed campaigners against the incinerator.
Posters on a social media page used by campaigners against the incinerator are sceptical.
They also said it did not address one part of the scrutiny councillors’ requests – seeking a right for ward councillors to refer permit permitting decisions to the council’s licensing or planning committees.
One said: “It did not need an ‘extensive review’ of the constitution to re-state this now with mock surprise,” noting it had often been pointed out in questions that Cabinet councillors had made a similar decision on other occasions.
“Looking in from the outside it seems like bad faith on the Cabinet’s part to have provided such a response.
“Though I am not surprised at it, they could at least be honest to say that they will not allow environmental permit decisions to be taken in the way the Place resolution proposed,” they said.
Sowerby Bridge ward councillor Adam Wilkinson (Lab), who opposes the application but is also a Cabinet member, posted on the Facebook page:
“It has always been possible for Cabinet to have taken the decision on the environmental permit.
“Indeed this has been done for previous CVSH applications.
“The default route in line with the constitution however is via officers, unless Cabinet decide otherwise.
“On this occasion it did not, something myself and other ward councillors disagreed with.
“The Place Scrutiny recommendation, which I proposed to that committee, was to suggest that ward councillors had the ability to refer a permitting decision to licensing or planning, regardless of what Cabinet themselves decide.
“This doesn’t seem to have been properly addressed,” he said.
Recently a 2,400-strong petition opposing the permit was presented to the council.
An issue whereby a resident is challenging the council’s decision to grant the permit by requesting a Judicial Review of it is not yet fully resolved.
A previous incinerator permit application for the Belmont site was effectively refused by a Planning Inspector citing health risks, but as the law stands companies can lodge further applications, and a second was granted by the council late last year.
Lakeland disappointed as Shaymen fall to opening day defeat
By Andrew Greaves
Frustrated Halifax Town boss Adam Lakeland reckons his side might have conceded the ‘worst’ National League goal of the weekend.
The Shaymen well to a 3-0 opening day defeat at Braintree Town and Lakeland wasn’t for mincing his words post-match.
His side were behind inside three minutes, Lewis Walker heading home for the hosts, before a Frank Terry effort doubled the lead.
Walker added his second 20 minutes from time to kill off the game before Will Harris missed a penalty for Halifax to cap off a woeful day on the road.
Lakeland told the Halifax Courier: “"They made us look fragile, weak, individually and collectively.
"If you get carved open or it's a well-worked set-play or an absolute banger of a goal, then sometimes you have to hold your hands up, but the goals we've conceded are just really poor goals.
"The reality is if you don't defend those situations and you don't stop the ball coming in your box, you don't defend the ball with more authority and aggression, and dominance, when it does come in your box, then you're going to concede goals.
"And you see some of the defending from their lads to stop us getting in, stop the ball coming in the box from crosses, intercepting crosses, blocking and throwing their bodies on the line, we could learn a bit from some of their defending."
That’s it for this edition - I hope the Halifax Town result hasn’t ruined too many weekends (I’m a Burnley fan so well used to tasting defeat!).
I’ll be back midweek with another edition but in the meantime, get in touch on calderdale@thelead.uk if there’s anything you think I should be looking at.
Until then, happy weekend!
Andrew