On the 6th September 2008, there was an interesting article in the Yorkshire Evening Post about two captured Russian cannon taken from a Russian ship at Sebastopol during the Crimean War. These were subsequently placed on Woodhouse Moor with great ceremony in 1857, and remained there until they were carted away in 1940 purportedly to be melted down as part of the war effort. The Moor may have lost the cannon, but it still has a connection to the Crimean War thanks to nearby Raglan Road and Cathcart Street, both named after Crimean War commanders.
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Once again, local residents have been furiously setting pen to paper to express their opinion on the proposal to establish barbeque areas on Woodhouse Moor. And no wonder, given the way so many have been disenfranchised by councillors who’ve gone out of their way to ensure that people not on the electoral register have a say in whether or not barbeques are legalised.
On Tuesday, there were letters from Bernard Atha, Jonathan Eyre, Albert Slingsby, and Christopher Todd. On Wednesday, there were letters from Colin and Marian Smith, Janet Sherwin, and Kathleen Mason. And on Friday, there were letters from Darrell Goodliffe, Louise Coombes, and Carol Millard.
All of the letters were against the proposal except the one from Lib Dem activist Darrell Goodliffe, who also had a letter published last Thursday.
In his recent letter to the Yorkshire Evening Post (Readers’ Letters 15.5.09), Darrell Goodliffe claims that the existing byelaws restrict the “legitimate freedom” of people without gardens to have barbeques on Woodhouse Moor. For this reason, he supports the council’s proposal to allow barbeques on the Moor. Mr Goodliffe says that the damage caused by barbeques will be limited by restricting them to designated areas. But to those who point out that drifting smoke would interfere with other park users’ right to breathe unpolluted air, he has no answer. Instead, he suggests that if drifting smoke is a problem, then the opponents of the barbeque proposal should also be calling for barbeques in private gardens to be banned. In effect, he’s saying that having to breathe barbeque smoke in a park is no different to having to breathe it in your garden. But to compare barbeques in public parks with barbeques in private gardens is not comparing like with like. If the smoke from my neighbour’s barbeque is causing a nuisance, I can ask him to put it out. If he ignores my request, I have the remedy at law of taking out an injunction to prevent him having barbeques in the future. But if barbeques are legalised on Woodhouse Moor, if I asked someone having a barbeque there to extinguish it, they would be within their rights to tell me to go to one of the other Leeds parks where barbeques are still banned. And for the same reason, I would have no remedy at law.
Recently, on the Yorkshire Evening Post website, a lady from Ottawa commented that she lives close by to what used to be a lovely park. Then her local authority legalised barbeques. As a result, the only people who now visit the park, are those who go there to have a barbeque. The residents of Hyde Park, Woodhouse and Headingley are fighting this proposal so that everyone can continue to enjoy Woodhouse Moor, not just a selfish minority.
The above photograph was taken on the 12th May 2009 and shows the smoke pollution from just one barbeque. Multiply this by 40 to get an idea of the level of pollution that Leeds City Council considers acceptable on a park which when it was purchased in 1857 was known as “the lungs of Leeds”.
It’s customary when writing to a newspaper, to supply an address. Many editors will refuse to publish your letter if you don’t. It’s about establishing your credentials as a real person, rather like the purpose of the electoral register. So it was highly significant that in his recent letter to the YEP, Darrell Goodliffe signed off as “Local Resident” rather than supplying an address (Readers’ Letters 7.5.09). Clearly for Mr Goodliffe, establishing in readers’ minds that here was a local resident who actually supports the barbeque proposal, was far more important than minor details like where he actually lives.
What’s not customary when writing to a newspaper is to state your political allegiance, unless of course you’re an active party member writing about an issue your party is deeply involved with. Under those circumstances, to deny your readers the benefit of that knowledge, might seem to some like a deception. I can understand though why someone would be tempted to do it. By stating your political allegiance, you run the risk that people might say “Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he”. Which is precisely what people have been saying since learning that Darrel Goodliffe is a Lib Dem activist.
There were lots of letters in this week’s Yorkshire Evening Post on the subject of the barbeque proposal. The first was published on Tuesday and was from Phil Graham asking why he should pay council tax when the council won’t uphold the byelaws. Of course it’s a rhetorical question because Phil knows very well that if he didn’t pay council tax, they’d come and lock him up. If the people who have illegal barbeques knew that the same fate awaited them, there wouldn’t be a barbeque problem. The second letter appeared on Wednesday and was from Councillor Martin Hamilton who says that if the police had to deal with anti-social behaviour on the Moor, they wouldn’t be able to deal with more serious crime elsewhere. Councillor Hamilton, a former chair of INWAC, fails to mention that INWAC can make council funds available to the police to pay for additional policing. He also fails to mention that the assignment of park wardens to the park would improve park security without affecting policing elsewhere in the area and that last July, a deputation of local residents asked the council for two park wardens to be assigned to Woodhouse Moor, and were refused. The next letter also appeared on Wednesday and was from L E Slack who feels that the barbeques are inappropriate in parks, and that the consultation process is unethical. On Thursday, there were letters from Darrell Goodliffe and Tony Green. Mr Goodliffe says that opponents of the barbeque proposal “suffer from a basic refusal to deal with reality” and wear “blinkers”. Tony Green in his letter reports on the recent public meeting and the resounding “No” it gave to the barbeque proposal. On Friday, Cherril Cliff who lives in Armley, but works in Woodhouse, voiced her opposition to the proposal. Also in Friday’s paper was a letter from Howard and Christine Eaglestone asking how likely it is that people will keep to the proposed barbeque areas. Then in today’ paper, in a relatively short letter, former Headingley councillor David Morton makes a number of highly relevant points about the proposal itself, the consultation, the ASB that’s allowed on the park, and the neglect.
On Friday the 1st May, Councillor Bernard Atha issued the following statement :
“The Moor is under sustained attack now. Every day sees further damage.
I am opposed totally to the proposals for the barbecue slabs. They would not be allowed in Roundhay or Horsforth or Guiseley. Why Woodhouse?
I have asked that this proposal be submitted for planning application. I have not yet had a response after more than a week.
I have asked that big notices be put up saying barbecues are a breach of the bye laws and offenders will be prosecuted.
I have asked that local funds available to the Councillors are used to pay for extra police supervision and enforcement.
I have pointed out that the Lib Dems could stop this scheme now. Labour has 42 votes in the Council and the nine Lib Dems have nine in Inner North West Leeds making sure that any proposal to stop the scheme and save the Moor could be carried.
I have objected to the views expressed by the local Lib Dem Councillor James Matthews that as we cannot police the park we had better control it by this plan.
I object to the other Lib Dems who say they await the result of the consultation which, as many have written in to say, is a fraud as so many local residents have not received the consultation document which in itself was designed to produce the answer required.
I object to the statement made by the Lib Dems who say that the scheme is Cllr John Procter’s idea. He is a Tory. The idea has not come from John Procter I am sure, and in any case the Lib Dems and the Conservatives have formed a coalition and the Lib Dems are the biggest Party in that coalition.
We must defeat this stupid and damaging proposal and collectively make sure the Moor is protected and supervised properly.
The Lib Dem coalition has mounted a series of attacks on the Moor : making part of it a car park, turning over a large area to accommodate University pitches, a drinking den for easier supervision of the alcoholics displaced from elsewhere and hacking away a substantial strip of it to form a bus lane to ease traffic on what is the widest stretch of road on this extremely busy route out of Leeds. These have all been schemes produced by the coalition in which the Lib Dems are the largest Party.”
