17 FEBRUARY 1998

MS ANNE WAREHAM, MS KATHRYN MANSELL, and MR PETER MCGREEVY

  61.  May I start off by welcoming you, and apologise first of all that the first session has overrun a little so that we are a little late starting. Would you please identify yourselves for the record?

   (Mr McGreevy)  Peter McGreevy.

   (Ms Mansell)  Kathryn Mansell.

   (Ms Wareham)  Anne Wareham.

  62.  And you are the Leys Road Allotments Association, Blackpool?

   (Ms Mansell)  Yes.

Chairman:  Thank you. Mrs Ellman?

  63.  Am I correct in thinking that the Leys Roads allotments are a relatively small part of the currently undeveloped land?

   (Ms Mansell)  Mr Chairman, yes.

  64.  How much of the protests to which you refer in your correspondence is about people in the area who are opposed to possible housing development rather than people who are concerned about what might happen to the allotments?

   (Ms Wareham)  There are two complete issues, Mr Chairman. We know that the allotments are a completely separate issue to the rest of the land, but a lot of us live in the area so we are both residents and allotment holders, so some of us are actually members of the action group which is Leys Farm and Allotment Action Group.

  65.  Can you clarify for the Committee how much of the opposition is a concern about the future of the Leys Road and how much is about the concern about housing development on a piece of land which is much larger than that occupied by allotments?

   (Ms Wareham)  I personally feel that the residents are concerned about the allotments, obviously not as much as we are, because they are not allotment holders.

We are very passionate in our concern for the allotments on the allotment site. I think that the allotments have been there so long that they are part and parcel of that site. They come down to the allotments, they talk to us, they watch us, they are interested in everything that goes on. The children round about are interested in what goes on. They are interested in the vegetable growing and in the wildlife round about and it is part and parcel of the local scene.

  66.  Can you explain the current position? Have you been offered an alternative allotments side should this plan go ahead?

   (Ms Wareham)  We have been offered an alternative site which we are not happy about. Would you like me to tell you why?

  67.  Tell us how far away it is for a start.

   (Ms Wareham)  It is one and three quarter miles away from where we are, and that is one reason that makes it very difficult for some of the elderly allotment holders to get there. They do not have cars. They come on their bicycles with their forks and their spades and their seeds and their plants on their bikes, and this is 80 year olds that are doing this.

  68.  Can you explain where the current users of the current allotments come from? Are they all very local or do some of them come over a distance?

   (Ms Wareham)  Apart from one we are all in the local area.

   (Ms Mansell)  They are mainly people living in the borough. There is only one or perhaps there are two who live outside the immediate area.

  69.  Outside the area or outside the borough?

   (Ms Mansell)  Outside the borough.

  70.  That is not the same as the immediate area, is it?

   (Ms Wareham)  I would like to say that that person who lives outside is probably one of the very few people who would be happy to take another site.

  71.  What sort of distance away from the current allotments do the users live apart from being outside the borough, which is really something else?

   (Mr McGreevy)  About three miles, I would think, that is, the people who live outside Blackpool borough.

  72.  Let us just be clear. How many plots are there altogether?

   (Mr McGreevy)  Originally there were 35. For some unknown reasons they whittled them down to 30 and there are quite a few untenanted ones because the corporation refused tenancies on them.

  73.  Right, but of the people originally two lived outside the borough so round about 28 lived within the borough, and of those 28 how many of them live closer to this site than the site that has now been proposed?

  (Ms Wareham)  I would say that more than three quarters that live on the promenade side of the site, and you know where that is.

  74.  I was just trying to establish in a comparative sense whether in the proposed new site the number of people would have to travel any further than they currently have to travel to get to the allotments?

  (Ms Wareham)  I would say more than three quarters.

  75.  I would like next to ask about the proposed alternative site should this development go ahead. Are most current allotment holders satisfied with that?

  (Ms Mansell)  No, they are not.

  76.  They are not?

  (Ms Mansell)  No, not at all. We have a majority vote of the plot holders who decided to send their objections to the secretary of state and object to this proposed alternative site for a number of reasons, the main one being the large electricity pylon directly in the centre of the site. We are extremely worried about this and we have collated an enormous amount of data on the very low frequency radiation and all the connected health hazards. There does not seem to be anybody that can absolutely definitely assure us of our safety in the future. We believe that the worry alone is probably equal to the actual health risk of the pylon itself, but there are a number of other reasons, the ground not being suitable for spade cultivation. The locals will vouch for the fact that it is known as carleton bog, the area that they have offered us. The land is currently open space on the borough plan and it has not been appropriated for allotment use and it would require consent. We gather that the plan was to have us up and running on the site and then apply for appropriation at a later date, which leaves us in rather a vulnerable position, we understand. The site is exposed to the elements. Our current site is nestled in amongst hedgerows and it is a very sheltered site. It is in the middle of a rapidly expanding industrial park, with pollution from new link roads, and then we have got the fact that it is much further away for three quarters of the people than the present site.

  77.  Has the local authority offered to make any improvements on the alternative site?

  (Ms Wareham)  They have offered to put drains in and they have offered to put windbreaks in. They need trees and bushes, which obviously will take years to grow. But our main problem is the great electric pylon.

We have got plot holders who have cancers, who have problems like this, and we have evidence to show that there is an association between cancers and the electric pylon, and Blackpool council themselves have said that there is evidence to show an association - not a causation, but an association. They are obviously really worried about that. They cannot go to a plot like that. I could not go to a plot like that.

  78.  You are making a very sweeping statement, a very serious statement.

  (Ms Wareham)  Yes, I know, but we have got a lot of evidence and research on that, if you would like to have it.

Mrs Ellman:  That is a bigger question.

  79.  I think that we should move on now. Are you happy with the response that you have had from the council or not?

  (Ms Mansell)  No.