Our allotments threatened with development.

[bicci]

Hello all,
We have been told by the council they are offering our
allotments up for development.
They propose to relocate us to the side of the M25 over a railway line
well out of sight in a clay swamp.
At the moment we are getting our thoughts together to form an
association to fight this.Any tips or advice on how to fight this
would be appreciated.
This is a big site in Leatherhead, the Barnett Wood Lane/Poors allotments.
Thanks

[vegpatchmum]

Can't offer any advice but my heart goes out to you all. I hope you can fight this.

VPM
x

[Primrose]

Again I don't have any specific advice but wonder how long your allotments have existed and whether there is any legal grounds for them to have been possibly registered as "public or community spaces"?. I really feel for you all.

[bicci]

Hi Primrose,
I believe they have been there since 1860 and were
given to the people of Leatherhead.
The council now think they own them, but we are looking
into this.

[Monika]

Good luck, bicci! Make as much fuss as possible on all available media. If you need it, this might also stir a lawyer to offer his services for free.

[peter]

Requires permission from Secretary of State, government minister, if they are Allotment Act allotments.

[Westi]

Bicci

Don't know if it helps but our allotment is under threat as well. They offered us a clay pit & the committee refused it as it has to be like for like..if it can't sustain crops it is not an allotment!

Keep searching into the allotment act - old but still used to fight the cause. Good Luck!

West
PS Welcome to the forum!

[Shallot Man]

Westi. If you all belong to the National Allotments Society. You will find their legal dept very helpful. If you all don't belong. JOIN NOW. It was hinted to us that our site was earmarked for development some seven years ago. We were already members. Finished up the redevelopment went bast one side of us.

[bicci]

Thanks chaps,
We are researching on various fronts.
There is a facebook page "SaveBarnettWoodLaneallotments" or
something similar.Our association is likely to be called
"Green Hearts" keeping the plot in the heart of the community in
walking distance of the town, not out in the green belt by the M25.
They are trying to bribe us by asking what improvements we would
like to have at the new site.The first informal drop in and chat about
it to the council sessions start next week, we are hoping to identify
interested campaigners.
Bicci

[John]

Hello Bicci
Sorry to hear of your problems.
I haven't had experience of your particular problem but I am part of a wind turbine action group here so will try to make a few suggestions.

In our situation it is the wind turbine developer and the objectors with the council in the middle supposedly listening to the arguments of both sides but for you it simply a them and us situation - your group against the council, which makes things much more difficult.
I would say that you should be very wary of the council. They will have been hatching this plan for some time and will have worked out their approach well in advance. They are tempting you with carrots at the moment by offering facilities at the proposed new site before they get heavy and try to force you out. Councils are under a lot of pessure from above to free up land for development and they probably see your allotments as a soft target.

Don't be fooled by any 'informal' meeting that they invite you to. Treat it as a formal meeting and make sure that one of you takes your own minutes of who is present and who says what. Don't agree to anything on the spot - give yourselves time to talk things over later in private before replying to any 'offers'. It will be essential to keep a written record of everything.
Don't be aggressive as you don't want to antagonise them but be prepared to get firm and fight your for your ground.
My guess is that you will be having to deal with the officers in the planning department and of course they will be very well versed in dealing with these situations. These people work to the various local strategies, plans and directives from government that the council has to implement. You will need to study these documents carefully - they will be on the council website.
Try to widen things and get local councillors involved as they are much my likely to be on your side. There are local elections coming in May - hopefully in your area. Some councillors standing for re-election will be keen to get themselves noticed supporting local issues.
If you decide to contact the local councillors put your case to all of them in a collective general email. Councillors are wary of being 'lobbied' individually.

To have any chance of success you will need to form a group - you seem to be doing this - as the council will need some formal body to deal with. This will have to have a simple constitution and a small committee. These are easy to set up and there are plenty of sample constitutions on the web which will be easy to adapt to your situation. Get a good contact list of your supporters together so that you can rally them at short notice for things like site meetings, council meetings ot press photos.

Finally it appears that your allotments have a long history. Do some serious research into how they were set up years ago and try to find details of any charity/trust that was formed at the time to run the land. Who gave the land originally. You might find that the council has no rights over the land and is just assuming the position of landlord.

Sorry this is a bit rambling but I hope it is of some help.

John

[bicci]

Thanks John,
We do believe that the council has just assumed ownership,
but it's difficult to prove.
We are hoping to gather supporters at the informal "meetings"
coming up soon.

[John]

Hello again Bicci
You don't have to prove anything. It is up to the council to prove that they have ownership and also the power to remove you. Don't accept anything less than clear documentary evidence from them. Don't let them give you the run-around.
If you do come up with any historical evidence of ownership - sit on it and wait for the council to come up with theirs'. Your local history society may be able to help you - they might want to take it up as a project.

I don't know how your site is situated but one good source of support for you might be the local residents near your site. If it is private housing I guess that they would much prefer you as neighbours that a great new 'affordable' housing estate on their doorstep. Nothing stirs up people more than a drop in value of their homes - though loss of property value is not a valid reason for a planning objection but it certainly gets owners thinking.

If you get to the stage where you need to get people to write letters to support your objections do not use signed, solicited submissions ( ie those pre-printed objection letters that you get people to sign) as councils don't take much notice of them. Give people blank letters (+ a return envelope) to complete from a separate list of your objections to send in individually as these will carry far more weight. Petitions are useful but often treated as a single objection.

John

PS Beware as all this sort of stuff soon begins to take over your whole life. I'm now obsessed with these useless windmills that occasionally generate extremely expensive electricity paid for by increasing our electricity bills.

[peter]

Please take note of what I said about the Allotment act, provision of allotments is one of the few statutory duties councils have to carry out and removing a site for development requires the permission of a government minister.

Councils can consolidate say three underused sites onto one, no problem, but to dispose of the two empty sites they have to follow some strict paths.

Never mind who owns the land, is it an Allotment acts coveted site? All council ones should be.

[bicci]

Thank you John and Peter,
You are right about it taking over your life, and we haven't really
started yet.
Our allotment is 103 plots as I understand it fully occupied.
They had to create more plots from unused ground at the back
to accomodate the high demand a few years back.
Last year they introduced paying separately for water and put
the cost up so much that you can pay by direct debit quarterly.
I'm not sure if this has put people off and the threat of development
will probably make some people give up.
We will go through the allotments act, but I expect the council
have already done that and that's why they are offering an
alternative site.
When we have formed our group (now have an email address) it
may be worth joining National Allotments Society- more economical
as a group.
I'm off to make badges and do some research now.
bicci

[John Walker]

bicci, you might want to have a look at what's happening with Farm Terrace allotments in Watford.

Their plots are under threat (you can read up on exactly why on their website), but the allotment holders there are mounting both a vigorous and creative campaign to defend them.

One key move they are making is to apply to have the allotment site nominated as a Community Asset, by using recently introduced legislation contained in the Localism Act 2011. I'm not sure how far they've got to date (you can contact them through their website) but you can read all about it here (click on 'press release' at the top of the page for the bit about Community Assets):

http://www.farmterrace.btck.co.uk/

If you use it, Farm Terrace is also on Twitter @SaveFarmTerrace = https://twitter.com/SaveFarmTerrace

I would think seriously about setting up a Twitter account and/or a Facebook page to bring people together and help spread the word. Social media is proving that there is power in numbers which can be used for all sorts of good things - including protecting our treasured allotments.