Much as I favour the dualling of the A40 from St Clears to
Haverfordwest, especially when stuck behind a slow-moving lorry
all the way from Canaston Bridge to Haverfordwest, my enthusiasm
is not sufficient to overcome my aversion to duff arguments.
So, when I read in the Western Telegraph that Stephen Crabb MP
was quoting figures on road safety to justify dualling the road,
I reached for the pencil and paper.
According to Mr Crabb, over the past 20 years ". . . there
have been only 286 accidents on that part of the A40 compared
to 630 accidents on the single carriageway section."
It occurred to Old Grumpy that these figures weren't quite as
dramatic as they appeared because the dualled section between
Carmarthen and St Clears is considerably shorter than that between
St Clears and Haverfordwest.
Indeed, according to the AA, from Salutation Square to the roundabout
at St Clears is 20.58 miles, while the dual carriageway from St
Clears to the roundabout at Carmarthen is 9.08 miles.
Doing the long division, you get 30.6 accidents per mile on the
dualled section compared to 31.49 on the other bit.
Averaging over the 20 year period leaves you with a difference
of just under four-hundredths of an accident per mile/year.
Hardly statistically significant!
Where fatalities are concerned, the road safety case is even less
impressive .
According to the Western Telegraph, the number of road deaths
is 35% greater on the single than the dual.
But, as the single is more than twice as long, they should be
over 100% greater, which means that, on a mile-for-mile basis,
you are three-times less likely to be killed on the what is claimed
to be the less safe route.
As a former newspaperman, I know that editors are constantly bombarded
with press releases from politicians eager to see their names
in print.
When I was at the Mercury, such communications were always subject
to a truth test.
Unfortunately, for the vast majority, it was destination-dustbin
after that.
Even more interesting is what isn't in the Western Telegraph.
Last week the Mercury published details of county councillors'
allowances and expenses.
As the Mercury and the Western Telegraph share the same editor,
we can presume that the same information was available to the
latter.
However, there is no mention of it in this week's edition.
The usual excuse for these omissions is that the Telegraph doesn't
repeat stories already published in the Mercury, but, as the Telegraph's
circulation is four-times greater, that policy deprives three-quarters
of the county's readers of this most interesting information.
For instance, following publication of the list of expenses in
this columnar territory, several people have emailed me to ask
how it is that Cllr Brian Hall manages to claim almost twice as
much mileage allowance as the Leader of the council and three
times more than the bronze medal winner, Cllr Bill Hitchings.
The answer is that travelling expenses may only be claimed for
"approved duties" and Cllr Hall seems to use a more
generous definition of this term than everyone else.
I will return to this topic in greater detail next week.
In the meantime, I notice that the Telegraph has published the
corresponding figures for the National Park Authority.
Helpfully, the National Park also provides details of members'
attendance records.
These show that two of the nominees from the county council's
ruling Independent Political Group, Cllrs John Allen-Mirehouse
and John Thomas, only narrowly beat the 50% mark.
Perhaps they should move over and let somebody else have a go.
In Squirehouse's case it can hardly be said that he needs the
£2,000 basic allowance because, in the year in question,
he was also entitled to £24,800 as deputy leader of the
county council and another £6,500 as one of the county council's
nominees to the Milford Haven Port Authority board.
What was even more interesting still was what wasn't in the
previous week's editions of our two local papers.
Despite reporters from both being present throughout the three-and-a-half-hour
county council meeting, there was no report of the debate on my
notice of motion calling for the revocation of the controversial
agricultural planning consent given to Cwmbetws Ltd (managing
director Cllr John Davies Leader of Pembrokeshire county council)
The Telegraph's report did mention that my notice of motion had
been defeated by 40 votes to 9 but most of the report, tucked
away on page 41 and headlined "Herdsman's house row rumbles
on", was given over to comments by the leader himself and
a sermon from Cllr Ken Rowlands.
The Leader told the Telegraph: "This is all mischief making
and I expect the mischief will continue. I refute the claims that
I sold the dairy herd before making the application. I sold the
herd well into the beginning of this year [before the planning
committee met]. I have evidence of milking at the time I made
the application." and "This is all the interpretation
of one councillor. It is about the applicant not the application."
This is a masterpiece of the politician's art; combining a straw
man, two red herrings and a non-sequitur into less than 70 words.
The straw man, so far as I am concerned, is the denial that the
cattle were sold prior to the application being submitted because
I have never made such an allegation.
The first red herring is the attempt to question my motives rather
than explain why Cllr Davies didn't inform the council that the
cattle had been sold prior to the planning committee meeting where
consent was given.
And the second: Cllr Davies assertion that "It is about the
applicant and not the application."
Of course it's about the applicant, who just happens to be the
all-powerful Leader of the county council. How he conducts himself
in that office is, surely, a matter of public interest.
And the non-seqiteur is the attempt to refute the allegation that
I haven't made with the words "I have evidence of milking
at the time I made the application."
Evidence of milking is, of course, not the same as evidence that
all 165 cattle listed on the "Agricultural Justification
Form" were on the farm when the application was made.
However, all that I have ever said is that these dairy cattle
were sold sometime between October 2004 when Cllr Davies signed
the "Agricultural Justification Form", which detailed
the stocking levels on the farm, including 165 dairy cattle, and
the planning committee meeting on 24 May 2005, which granted planning
consent for an agricultural dwelling based on the same 165 dairy
cattle and the "farming regime" required to look after
them.
I have emailed the Leader suggesting that, in order to clear this
issue up once and for all, he should make available for inspection
the farm's animal movements records.
I also emailed the editor of the Western Telegraph to complain
about the unbalanced nature of the paper's coverage and demanding
the right to reply to which I am entitled under the Press Code.
Following this, I was allowed to have a letter published, though
only after cutting it down to little more than half its original
size.
The full text of my original letter is printed below.
Dear Editor,
In last week's edition, under the headline "Herdsman's house
row rumbles on" you quoted county council leader Cllr John
Davies as saying: "This is all mischief making and I expect
the mischief making to continue" and "This is all the
interpretation of one councillor. It is about the applicant not
the application."
I utterly reject the implication that I am conducting some sort
of personal vendetta against Cllr Davies.
Indeed, if anyone cares to go to the library and read my Old Grumpy
columns in the back numbers of the Mercury, they will find the
need for fairness in the planning system is a consistent thread
running through my writings for almost fifteen years.
My interest in this matter stems from the belief that equality
before the law is the cornerstone of true democracy and that nothing
is more damaging to the image of local government than the widely-held
public perception; often articulated as 'it's not what you know,
but who you know', that planning decisions owe more to string-pulling
and influence-peddling than to any objective consideration of
the merits of the case.
This issue involves an application by Cwmbetws Ltd (managing director
Cllr John Davies) for an agricultural dwelling at Cwmbetws Farm,
near Eglwyswrw.
Before such applications are granted there must be proof of a
"functional need" for someone to live "on the spot".
The application, which was accompanied by an "Agricultural
Justification Form (AJF)", was received by the council on
1 November 2004.
The AJF, which is used to calculate the holding's labour requirements,
listed 165 dairy cattle, 162 other cattle and 350 tack sheep.
These same stocking numbers appeared in the report to the planning
committee of 24 May 2005, when the application was approved.
The report concluded: "Based on the size of the holding and
the farming regime there is considered to be a functional need
for an additional dwelling to house a full time worker . . ."
The "farming regime" referred to involves tending to
165 dairy cows.
When calculating the labour requirements of a farm, dairy cattle
rate 36 hours per annum, other cattle 16.
So the presence of the dairy cattle was crucial to establishing
the "functional need" for an extra worker and, therefore,
the house in which they are to live.
We now know that, sometime between the submission of the application
and the planning committee meeting, Cwmbetws Ltd disposed of the
milking part of the herd.
Clearly, then, the planning committee's decision was founded on
manifestly false information.
It is my view that a quasi-judicial decision based on flawed evidence
should not be allowed to stand, hence my Notice of Motion calling
for the consent to be revoked.
It came as no surprise to me that this was defeated by 40 votes
to 9, but I console myself with the thought that the truth is
not measured by counting heads.
Regarding Cllr Davies' conduct, I would suggest that he had at
least a moral duty to inform the council of this change in the
farm's stocking levels, either when he started to dispose of the
herd rendering the AJF redundant, or when he received the agenda
for the planning committee and saw that the information, on which
the recommendation of approval was based, was out of date and
inaccurate.
Whether he also had a legal duty, under the members' Code of Conduct,
is a question I will leave for the Ombudsman to decide.
Even stranger than the Telegraph's cursory treatment of this topic
was the total news blackout in the Mercury.
I know the Mercury was working on the story because a reporter
rang me to ask for a statement about what had occurred at the
meeting (see Herd Instinct).
I emailed the following:
"The way the Chairman abused his powers to deny me
the right of reply to the debate was a disgrace to democracy.
He should try to understand that he wears the chain of office
on behalf of all the people of Pembrokeshire and not just the
38 members of the Independent Political Group.
I particularly wanted to speak again because most of the Independent
Political Group's attempts to justify the leader's planning consent
owed more to Alice in Wonderland than serious political debate.
I was also bitterly disappointed that only three of the eight
Labour members present felt able to support my notice of motion.
And this is supposed to be the party of social justice!"
Easily the most fatuous contribution to the debate on this
matter is that of Cllr Ken Rowlands the Labour member for Johnston.
Cllr Ken told the Telegraph: "With regard to the current
application I personally cannot conceive of a situation that anyone
given the honour of leading this authority would throw away the
enormous goodwill of his fellow members and lose his total integrity
over a controversial planning matter."
Presumably, nor can Cllr Rowlands conceive of a situation where
Cabinet Ministers such as David Blunkett, Peter Mandelson and
Stephen Byers would risk losing their total integrity by either
lying to Parliament or abusing their ministerial powers to help
out their friends with passport and visa applications.
And, for the sake of political balance, I should also mention
Jonathan Aitken and Lord Archer who brought political ruin on
themselves by lying under oath.
Of course, what Cllr Rowlands can and cannot conceive is entirely
beside the point.
There are people who find it inconceiveable that the earth is
roughly spherical.
They join the Flat Earth Society.
What is important is not what Cllr Rowlands finds conceivable
but the facts, as set out above.
As Cllr Rowlands says in another part of his statement: "Each
planning application should be considered on the merits and demerits
of the case alone .. ."
Clearly for that to happen the planning committee must know exactly
what those merits and demerits are.
In the present case, the most important merit, so far as the planning
committee was concerned, was the "functional need" which
rested on the presence of a 165-strong dairy herd at Cwmbetws
Farm.
And one person who certainly knew that was no longer the case
was the Leader of the council, Cllr John Davies.
If there is any doubt in Cllr Rowlands' mind about the planning
policy issues involved, I would refer him to the Welsh Assembly's
Technical Advice Notes (TAN) on this subject.
TAN 6 paragraph 41 states "New permanent dwellings should
only be allowed to support existing agricultural activities on
well-established agricultural units, providing:
(a) there is a clearly established existing [WAG's emphasis]
functional need.
Any functional need that may have existed in October 2004 had
clearly ceased to exist when the planning committee met on 24
May 2005.
The three books that have most influenced my political views
are "Capitalism and Freedom" by Milton Friedman; "The
Road to Serfdom" by F A Hayek; and George Orwell's "Animal
Farm".
A short quote from each will help you to understand where I am
coming from and why I cannot accept what presently goes on inside
Pembrokeshire County Council.
First Friedman: "How can we keep the government we create
from becoming a Frankenstein that will destroy the very freedom
that we establish it to protect? Freedom is a rare and delicate
plant. Our minds tell us, and history confirms, that the great
threat to freedom is the concentration of power. Government is
necessary to preserve our freedom, it is an instrument through
which which we can exercise our freedom; yet by concentrating
power in political hands, it is also a threat to freedom."
And Hayek on why some people are attracted to political parties
that exist only for the purpose of wielding power: "The
only tastes which are satisfied are the taste for power as such,
the pleasure of being obeyed and of being part of a well-functioning
and immensely powerful machine to which everything else must give
way."
And finally Orwell's descriptions of Pembrokeshire County Council
more than 50 years before the event : "After the hoisting
of the flag all the animals trooped into the big barn for a general
assembly known as the Meeting. Here the work of the coming week
was planned out and resolutions were put forward and debated.
It was always the pigs who put forward the resolutions. The other
animals knew how to vote but could never think of any resolutions
of their own." and: "Many meetings were held
in the big barn, and the pigs occupied themselves with planning
out the work of the coming season. It had come to be accepted
that the pigs, who were manifestly cleverer than the other animals,
should decide all questions of farm policy, though their decisions
had to be ratified by a majority vote."