Blackstone, minutes of meetings, you said there was none, unless I misunderstood

Dear Not Ms Naven.

You replied before indicating there were no minutes of any meetings
regarding the major Blackstone Development:-

http://democracy.stockport.gov.uk/ieList...

Perhaps I have misunderstood your reply but all I could find in
what you sent me were a few duplicate agendas.

Would you please check once more to see if you can find anything
written at all about this site development, which is gassing
74.4%v/v methane, and in contamination documents mysteriously sent
to me after being labouriously photocopied and posted at great
expense, explosion risk was mentioned as a distict possibility. It
beggars belief that nothing has been committed to paper and there
are no emails or minutes, or memos, or letters regarding this large
development.

When I have your response clarifying this matter, I shall raise it
publicly with Eric Pickles, who is advocating changes to the
planning system which is enraging not only the Daily Telegraph but
most people who vote. If there can't even be any transparency in
Coalition Minister Andrew Stunell's own constituency by his
political cohorts even before the watering down of the planning
process, well, we are all doomed, doomed.

So, can you find anything at all except a few duplicate agendas
regarding this presumably multi-million pound development? When I
have your reply I shall draw it to the attention of Mr Pickles and
the Daily Telegraph.

With very warmest best wishes

Sheila

Dear FOI Officer,

That's fine. I really couldn't believe there was such a paucity of
information on such an important development. This is Stockport so
it was perfectly feasible that everything would be kept secret, as
with the toxic waste dump school, but I wanted to give you the
opportunity to respond in case I had got hold of the wrong end of
the stick.

So, for a multi-million pound project there are about four almost
identical meeting agendas but no outcomes.
I shall raise the matter with the Daily Telegraph. If this is what
is going on in planning currently, the rules most definitely
shouldn't be relaxed even further.

74.4%v/v methane and an explosion risk, yet no-one has actually
discussed anything - only in Stockport could that sort of happen.

Yours sincerely,

Sheila Oliver

Dear FOI Officer,

Well, I couldn't see any documents about the high levels of methane
or CO2 being discussed with the developers.

What would be best is if I come to your premises and read the files
of the top person in charge of this project - whether that is Steve
Burns or someone junior to him - whatever. Knowing Mr Burns I am
sure there will be custard creams.

I wanted to do this with the toxic waste dump school. I had done it
in, I think, October 2005. But Andrew Webb, Director of Children
and Young Peoples Services, said it would take 84 hours at £25 per
hour to read and redact the files to remove all the secrets
regarding this primary school before I could see the documents -
plus £300 photocopying costs - request refused to me and anyone
else in the World. You have made out my request to be vexatious on
grounds of cost. It would have cost nothing to simply read through
the documents, which is what I wanted to do. I had done that
previously with the Tesco they built 20% too big and the bypass. My
way of doing it would have and did cost nothing. Your way is
ridiculous.

So, how about simply letting me come and read the relevant files?

I don't know, senior council officers make things expensive when
there is a simple and cheap way of doing things, and then blame the
council taxpayer.

Yours sincerely,

Sheila Oliver

Dear FOI Officer,

I would like to come and see something - anything about this
project. I used to come and be given a massive pile of files and
plough through them (I accept now that not everything is in paper
copy form). Mr Andrew Webb stopped me doing that for the toxic
waste dump school. At that time all the files were all in one place
because I had read them a few months earlier.

It seems to me it is a simpler and cheaper way of dealing with
matters - to come to your office and read through what you have. If
there are deliberate concealments, these usually show up anyway.

I am having to include the allegation that I waste public money in
my defamation case against senior council officers and Executive
councillors, because had Mr Webb let me read the documents, there
would have been no cost. Anyway, he was being econonomical with the
truth, because no way would it take 84 hours for someone to read
through the documents removing all the secrets for a primary
school!!! Who does he think he is kidding, and I have evidence that
I had already seen the documents and they were all in one place.

I intend to give the defamation damages to the parents of autistic
children in the town, who are really being stitched up by this
council, but that is a story for another time.

So, let me come and see what you have - quite simple. The contract
is awarded now so I assume there can be no commercial
confidentiality.

We are supposed to look under the bonnet of local councils and be
armchair auditors. Fat chance with Stockport Council and the
ueber-secretive LibDems in control. I wonder what there is to hide,
I really do.

Yours sincerely,

Sheila Oliver