Councillors urged to resign at Warwickshire village where option for 6,700 new homes is being considered
FOUR members of a south Warwickshire parish council were threatened with legal action this week for allegedly taking too long to register their interests in land that might be used for a massive housing development.
The dramatic threat was issued at a packed meeting on Tuesday (25th February) evening when over 100 local residents crowded into their village hall to challenge their parish council over its response to the idea of having 6,700 new homes built on land stretching from Wilmcote to Bearley.
The special meeting of Wilmcote Parish Council became so heated that:
One councillor made a passionate personal statement expressing disgust over his family being vilified on a What’s App group
- There were expressions of no confidence in the council’s response to the threat to Wilmcote
- Calls were made for the whole council to resign
- Councillors with “vested interests” were told to step down immediately
- The council was accused of failing to communicate with its own residents
At the meeting it emerged that four members of the council’s seven-strong complement (normally there are eight, but there’s a vacancy) had an interest in land that could potentially be sold to developers for the enormous new settlement now being considered as an option in the draft Local Plan.
Although certain councillors had registered a “non-pecuniary” interest, there’s confusion and suspicion over how “non-pecuniary” this is.
And one local resident, Cai Remrod, was so angry over what he described as a delay in them registering their interests that he threatened to report them to the monitoring officer of Stratford District Council if they didn’t resign by Monday (3rd March).
Mr Remrod added: “Instead of me going to the monitoring officer and them reporting it to the police, they [the councillors] should just step down. If I don’t hear anything by Monday I’ll report it to the monitoring officer.”
Earlier one of the councillors who’d declared a non-pecuniary interest, Cllr Leo Mahon, made an impassioned personal statement.
Cllr Mahon said that although he did not expect to benefit from the sale of any land he had declared an interest for the purposes of transparency.
“The majority of the land is owned by my extended family,” he said. “I don’t own any land. It’s owned by a company of which I have a minority share. I am only one of multiple shareholders. Because I don’t have a direct interest I don’t expect to benefit from this land.”
Cllr Mahon said there was no certainty the land would be sold. There was no decision on whether it should be sold. “The financial expectations remain completely uncertain,” he said.
He said that while he had acted in good faith, other people hadn’t. He referred to a What’s App Group in which there had been references to the recent death of his father. “People should be ashamed of themselves,” he said. “I am so, so ashamed of this parish speaking like this about such a sensitive issue. I know who they are and they should be ashamed of themselves.”
At one point the chairman of the council, Cllr Colin Ray, said it had been brought to his attention that even he should declare an interest because his daughter was married to the brother of one of the land-owning councillors, Cllr Karl McMillan.
This raised general bewilderment about where the line is drawn between having an interest and not having an interest.
The other councillors who’ve declared an interest, along with Cllr Mahon, are James Boyes and Kate Shilvock.
Although the announcement of the special parish council meeting said press and public were welcome to attend, Cllr Ray began the proceedings by saying it was not a public meeting. A public meeting had already taken place.
After protests he said he would allow “a few questions”. This prompted a man to shout: “There are over a hundred people here. It’s incumbent upon you to allow questions, not just a few questions.”
A woman said: “This is the most important thing this village had had to debate since whenever. It’s incumbent upon the council to allow as much time as possible to debate this really important matter.” This brought a big round of applause.
The thorny question of parish councillors who’d declared an interest meant that they were excluded from the ensuing debate. That left only three members – Cllr Ray, Cllr Sarah Hession and Cllr Gavin Stewart, plus the clerk Liz Butterworth – to face the anxious residents.
At one point a woman who said she’d not been informed about a particular meeting said: “The parish council is useless at communicating with people in this village.”
A man said: “The parish council should spend some money on having its website updated.” And a woman declared: “There’s a loss of confidence in this parish council and people who’ve got a vested interest should step away.” A man quipped: “We’re all against the development but it feels like we’re fighting the parish council.”
A woman said: “People have tried to hide their interests.” And a man said: “It doesn’t seem that we’re all on the same side.”
Cllr Hession said: “I spoke to the monitoring officer and she said they [the councillors with interests] should step away [from meetings and votes].
“Morally speaking four councillors with a vested interest should not be on the parish council.”
A woman asked: “Will they step down?” And Mrs Butterworth, the clerk, said: “If you have a problem contact the monitoring officer. I don’t think they want to step down.”
Cllr Hession said: “People are asking them to stand down. If they don’t want to, there’s nothing you can do.”
Eventually Cllr Ray said he would write to the councillors who’d registered an interest asking them to consider their positions.
On the main subject under discussion – the 6,700 new homes – Cllr Hession read out a statement outlining the council’s opposition to the idea. It was then agreed that this needed to be “beefed up” by a professional planning consultant.
But then there was alarm at the thought that such a statement could not be put together in time for the 7th March deadline of the current consultation process.
A woman then said: “There doesn’t seem to be any urgency. There’s a week left and it doesn’t seem you are listening to us. I’m leaving this meeting feeling that nothing will get done and that you’re not aware of the intensity of feeling and taking it on board.”
But then Cllr Ray, in a reference to the four councillors, said: “I’ve got the message. Yes, this letter will be written immediately.”
The meeting ended with the realisation that the parish council has to move fast – on a number of fronts.
- This article was updated to clarify a quote from Cllr Hession about advice from the monitoring officer at SDC.
