BREAKING NEWS - West Norfolk Council formally launches legal challenge to incinerator credits decision
BOROUGH council chiefs have today, Friday, formally begun their legal fight against a government decision to award £91 million towards the cost of the Lynn incinerator project.
They have demanded disclosure of all the evidence which persuaded environment secretary Caroline Spelman to award the grant last month, after she had stated the criteria for the cash had not been met last November.
The demand was made in a pre-action protocol letter sent to Defra today and follows the council’s decision last month to press ahead with legal action.
West Norfolk Council leader Nick Daubney said: “It is regretful that it has come to this, but we have been frustrated at every turn by Defra’s apparent unwillingness to engage with us throughout this process.
“We have telephoned, e-mailed and written to the Secretary of State’s office asking for copies of the evidence and so far this has not been forthcoming.
“None of this is surprising given that prior to the Secretary of State’s decision being announced, we had written to her on no less than 12 separate occasions without receiving a response and all my requests for a meeting were not even acknowledged.
“It is shocking that a decision of such magnitude can be taken with such a lack of transparency.
“The pre-action protocol letter that we have sent today places a duty upon the Secretary of State to disclose the evidence and information that convinced her to change her mind.”
The letter specifically calls for Ms Spelman to provide copies of all the evidence she received on the issue between November 7 last year and January 18 this year.
The council claims the secretary of state has until February 27 to respond.
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Sunday 27 May 2012
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Comments
There are 14 comments to this article
Page 1 of 1
rush2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 07:01 PMF Clark = C*NT
littletony
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 05:35 PMThe other thing that puzzles me is that West Norfolk Council based at King’s Lynn have on the payroll a full team of so called ‘lawyers’ yet every time that council needs a decent legal view on anything they agree to pay an outside firm of highly expensive lawyers to represent them instead. If the ones employed all year round at Lynn are not capable of doing legal work then they should be sacked because they are being paid a fortune every month and for what exactly ? They are obviously too useless to appear in court yet are quite happy to collect tens of thousands each and every year from the tax payer. Another waste of office space countenanced by Nick Daubney.
F Clark
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 03:35 PMWaste incinerators have been refused by courts, so we have to keep fighting. I will never accept a waste incinerator in King's Lynn.
rush2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 02:48 PMTheresa Carman get real,they represent themselves. MONEY,MONEY.MONEY....I could go on...
littletony
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 10:56 AMPlease do not let Daubney and Long pull the wool. They knew about this deal years ago but at the time they wanted Palm Paper to go through and so they kept quiet. They are still keeping quiet about this as well. They know this is a waste of money in court but it is being done so they can say that they did all they could for the people when in reality all they want is to be able to get voted back in again. Daubney and especially Long had every detail at their fingertips and Brian Longs paw prints are all over this deal. He was the one that was the key in pushing this past at King’s Lynn Council. He appears to just say whatever he thinks people want to hear in order to remain in office. These people are very quick to spend this money on legal fees. the lawyers will be quick to take to cash but will they advise them about how stupid they are being. This is a lost cause but Long and Daubney could not care less as long as they get voted back in which is what this is all about.
aeschylus
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 10:38 AMThe problem is Theresa that you have to realise when the game is up, the High Court have overturned a appeal, the Goverment have released the funds. contracts have been signed, even the advertising agency turned down complaints about Cory;s newsletter. As much as I dont want the thing built here either, just now wasting a stack load of council tax money on a fruitless court case is just plain daft, it is coming we are going to have to accept that. This court case will cost a fortune probably circa £200K, that money could be much better spent elsewhere, and of course no doubt we wil all get an increase in our coucil tax bills beacause of it
TheresaCarman
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 09:59 AMWest Norfolk Council are representing the people of Norfolk, unlike Norfolk County Council, thank you!
rush2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 09:31 AMIf anyone wants to complain about the incinerator plans, you can contact Nick Daubney at any of the various coffee shops, or indeed his wife's shop at any given time of the week. Don't try the Council offices.
rush2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 05:37 AMDon't waste your time time to the comments below! This WILL go ahead!!
F Clark
Friday, February 10, 2012 at 11:00 PMNick Daubney is doing what the majority of West Norfolk people and the people across the whole of Norfolk want him to do. We have been taken to the cleaners by NCC we need to send as many objections as possible against this white elephant.Please email your objections to willowsprc@norfolk.gov.uk we do not have many days left to object ends 20 Feb 2012.
rush2012
Friday, February 10, 2012 at 06:45 PMDave 30 pieces of silver
Dave King's Lynn
Friday, February 10, 2012 at 05:39 PMlittletony do you also use the name Dickens on the EDP site or have you just copied his words? This has nothing to do with a spat between Murphy and Daubney. Daubney has taken this action because he was forced to by the people his borough. You may not realise it but in a democracy you have to go with the will of the people who vote you into power! How Daubney feels about Murphy is not the isuue, the people of West Norfolk hate Murphy, Borrett, and the whole filthy cabinet and those people would have had most conservative councillors out of power last May if they had not turned against incineration. Even the snivelling Langwade voted last March to oppose the incinerator then forgot to actually oppose it when wearing his county hat earning his 12 pieces of silver.
rush2012
Friday, February 10, 2012 at 05:09 PMlittetony...At last a voice of reason over this business. The Council and it's idiot leader Daubney will not win this. As always, too little too late. Get rid of Daubney and his cronies NOW!. Wonder how many Councillors will be lining up a) for his job and b) for big fat contracts...they haven't got connections these Councillors have they?
littletony
Friday, February 10, 2012 at 05:07 PMSo the Leader of King’s Lynn Council has finally felt what it is like to be completely ignored on something ? Perhaps he now knows how residents feel when they make a polite approach to the local authority on an issue that is important to them and are met with a wall of silence, letters ignored, emails not answered and busy getting nowhere. He needs to wake up and smell the coffee. This whole incinerator issue appears to be all about a spat between Daubney and Murphy. It is personal not political and Daubney knows he cannot win yet he is prepared to waste a fortune of tax payers money in a legal challenge on something that he was originally in favour of along with his chum Brian Long. They could have done something about this years ago if they had wanted to. It is only recently that they have both done a U turn. These two are not fooling anyone and they are about to waste a fortune (yet again) of council tax money just to spite Derrick Murphy. What a pair of hopelessly inept hypocrites we have in charge of our council.
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