In a slight of hand worthy of Colonel Gaddaffi, a planning application was submitted to the East Riding of Yorkshire Council on 9th February 2011 by Messrs Barton and Mainprize (see image above)  to use the site for temporary storage. No mention was made of the PCT , the construction of the new hospital or the nature of the materials stored. Unsurprisigly, therefore, the application was granted without any fuss on 25th March 2011. You can check the lack of information supplied for youself under the planning reference 11/00497/PLF.

At the Local Community Liaison Group meeting on 30th March, in response to questioning on the issue, the PCT confirmed that they had indeed rented the Right Car site. When pressed as to why they had kept this a secret, the PCT answered saying that there was a risk materials stored on-site would be stolen if they publicised what they were doing.

This is symptomatic of the paternalistic attitude of the PCT (and ERYC) in general and with this development in particular: we know what is best for you and we are not going to tell you about it until we have done it. It also raises a number of other serious questions:

1. Did the ERYC know who was applying to store materials on the site and, if so, why did they not tell anybody?
2. There were very strict planning conditions relating to the construction of the hospital in terms of the provision of a right-turning filter lane and pedestrian lights etc., what happened to these?
3. There is a very strong rumour that the PCT were using the old Right Car site to store building materials prior to applying for planning permission, is this true?
4. If the above was true, why was no enforcement action taken?
5. Has any account been taken of the extra traffic movements on Swinemoor Lane as a result of the trans-shipment of materials from the old Right Car site?
6. Has any account been taken by ERYC Highways of the HGV movements to and from the old Right Car site, which is much closer to Grove Hill Roundabout?
7. Have there been any alterations to the planning conditions imposed by elected councillors by unelected officials?
8. Why did ERYC Highways not keep members of the NSH group informed of any requests by the developers of the site (the PCT) to vary planning conditions as they promised they would at a meeting on the 17th December 2009?

These questions will be put to the council shortly, however, once again, as with the original Outline Planning Permission application, the purchase of the site by the PCT, the removal of the hedgerows, the lack of consultation and the finding of the Great Crested Newt, the lack of tranparency by the PCT and ERYC is palpable…..and unacceptable.

Any Government body can only base its decision on the information supplied to it. If that information is factually incorrect or is deficient, any decision based upon it is likely to be poor.  As the techies would say ‘garbage in, garbage out.’  It was the ERYC’s planning department’s job to ensure that any errors or deficiencies in the submissions presented to them were corrected.  For some reason, in the case of this hospital on this site, they chose not to.

Mr Whitfield, stop hiding behind the smokescreen of poor decisions, listen to the people of Swinemoor, such as Mr Fox whose letter appeared in the Beverley Guardian on 1st April 2011. Or local constituent Mr Hall, whose letter appeared in the same publication on 8th April.

This is the wrong ‘cottage’ hospital in the wrong place. Instead of having a go at Mr Jackson, why not start asking questions about why such an unsuitable site was foisted upon the PCT in the first place?

This way you would be supporting those whose vote you wish to secure on May 5th.

 Our Ref: DC/10/02411/STREME/STRAT/SL2

Your Ref: Contact: Mrs Susan Hunt Telephone: (01482) 393840/393666

Erection of a community hospital with associated car parking (appearance, landscaping, layout and scale to be considered) following Outline permission 09/02646/STOUT at Land South East Of Swinemoor Lane Roundabout Swinemoor Lane Beverley East Riding Of Yorkshire for NHS East Riding Of Yorkshire

You wrote to me about the above application, and I confirm that your views were taken into consideration when the application was discussed. After taking all relevant issues into consideration, the Council has resolved to grant planning permission subject to the following conditions:-

1. No development shall take place (or as otherwise agreed in writing with the Local Planning Authority) until details of the materials to be used in the construction of the external surfaces of the development hereby permitted have been submitted to and approved in writing by the Local Planning Authority. Development shall be carried out in accordance with the approved details. This condition is imposed because the use of inappropriate materials could be harmful to the appearance of the area and that the Council, therefore, needs to retain a measure of control in accordance with Policy SP5 of the Joint Structure Plan and Policy D1 of the Beverley Borough Local Plan.

2. The development hereby permitted shall be carried out in accordance with the following approved plans:

(P)001 Rev- Location Plan (P)002 Rev- Existing Site Layout (P)003 Rev B Site Layout (P)101 Rev B Ground Floor Plan (P)103 Rev- Roof Plan (P)201 Rev A Elevations – General (P)202 Rev A Elevations – Community A (P)203 Rev A Elevations – Community B (P)204 Rev A Elevations – Community C (P)205 Rev B Elevations – Community D (P)301 Rev- Sections 1 of 2 (P)302 Rev- Sections 2 of 2 (P)501 Rev- Energy Centre A & Bin Store General Arrangements (P)502 Rev- Energy Centre B General Arrangement (P)503 Rev A Cycle Shelter (P)504 Rev- Bin Store B (P)601 Rev- Topographical Survey (P)701 Rev- View from South West of Site (P)702 Rev- View from North East of Site (P)703 Rev- View from North of Site (P)704 Rev- View from South of Site 28952-P-12-01 Rev B Finished Level Layout WT101070L01 Rev J General Arrangement Plan Landscape 101070L02 Rev A Site Sections WT101070L10 Rev D Planting Plans 1 of 4 WT101070L11 Rev B Planting Plans 2 of 4 WT101070L12 Rev A Planting Plans 3 of 4 WT101070L13 Rev D Planting Plans 4 of 4 101070L14 Rev A Grass Seed Species Mixtures WT101070L15 Rev G Coloured Landscape Masterplan 101070D01 Rev A Newt Barrier & Pedestrian Gate Detail 101070D02 Rev- Typical Pond Details 101070R04 Rev- Edible Landscape Strategy This condition is imposed for the avoidance of doubt and to ensure that the development hereby permitted is carried out in accordance with the approved details in the interests of the character and amenity of the area and the provisions of the development plan.

3. The development hereby permitted shall only be carried out in accordance with the Great Crested Newt and reptile mitigation strategy outline in the Environmental Statement. This condition is imposed in order to ensure that the development and mitigation measures accord with the requirements set out in the Environmental Statement , in accordance with Joint Structure Plan for Hull and East Riding of Yorkshire policy ENV3 and Beverley Borough Local Plan policy E18.

Please inform me if you require further details or an explanation of this decision.

Yours sincerely

Peter Ashcroft Head of Planning and Development Management

In the BBC interview, Karen Knapton says The way that we’ve designed [the facility] is to tone in with the environment. Hogwash! The view over the fields of Swinemoor, that has essentially remained the same for over 400 years, will be completely destroyed. This was an area that was described by the East Riding of Yorkshire Council in 2005 as ‘a high quality landscape’ yet the council chose to ignore their own planning policies (E10) and ‘direct’ the PCT to this site in 2008. Why?

Karen Knapton goes on to say ‘Patients will be able to look out onto the green fields’. Presumably these are the same green fields that the people of Swinemoor USED to look out upon. I’m sure the residents in this deprived part of Beverley will enjoy a view of the hospital instead, after all it is in tone with the environment….

Sloppy use of puntuation by the BBC journalist in the next paragraph makes it impossible to determine whether these were Karen Knapton’s exact words, however, the article does say that Development of the £19 million facility was delayed when protected Great Crested newts were discovered on the site, which were subsequently trapped and removed. As has been stated before on this blog, it was the determination of the East Riding of Yorkshire Council and the PCT to run roughshod over planning regulations in order to build a hospital on this site that led to this situation. Had the council insisted on an Environmental Impact Assessment and adequate surveying in accordance with published caselaw and planning guidance, this would never have happened.

As to the newt fencing remaining up in the future, NSH will need to check the terms in the PCT’s European Protected Species licence, which they obtained from Natural England. Watch this space.

Last week’s Beverley Guardian contained an excellent letter from Tudor Jackson which, in a nutshell, encapsulated all the things that NSH has been saying about the hospital site to anyone that will listen, i.e. it will flood, cause parking problems in neighbouring streets and traffic snarl-ups on Swinemoor Lane.  SENSE.

“Well done” Councillor Rounding and the Driffield Town Council for getting to grips with the Alfred Bean Hospital crisis.

I understand the NHS plan is to replace the Alfred Bean  Hornsea Hospital and  the Beverley Westwood Hospital with a new 36 bed hospital on Swinemoor  Lane, Beverley.      With a small amount of research, I  have found that the East Yorkshire Council have given outline planning permission to build on a bog, with a colony of Great Crested newts (the NHS is spending £41,000 to get rid of them), a  deposit  has already been paid to  Beverley Consolidated Charity for the land, and the Westwood  Hospital  site may have already been promised to Agents to sell for property development. Are the bureaucrats out of control?

The quote from Ivan Ellul recently in the Driffield Times said “The development is critical for our plans to deliver care closer to home, allowing us to bring more services out of larger hospitals into the community” This is called “spin”, not telling the whole truth. Patients and visitors from Driffield and Hornsea will have to travel to Beverley; this is not “closer to home”.

Marie Antoinette, when told “The poor have no bread”, is reputed to have said “Let them eat cake” Perhaps Oliver Thompson should tell Ivan Ellul “the poor and old of Driffield and Hornsea cannot visit their sick in hospital because there is no public transport”, will he respond  “Let them take taxis”!

Is it time to storm the Bastille?

Brian Thompson, Driffield

Driffield Times 4th August 2010

NSH says: Thanks too to Driffield Councillor Steve Poessl  for his support at the Pre-Committee presentation in Beverley, on 9th August 2010

Despite our questions being put to the Council’s planning department, a verbal response only was provided, i,e, that some enquiries were made with the front line staff, and that “the petition must have been handed-in too early”.

Even our MP, Mr Stuart ignores us and the respondents on his own blog!

Unless Mr N. Pearson does not read his local press, he cannot have missed reading about these residents’ frustrations and yet, the second petition, duly handed-in on 18^th June 2010 (receipt requested and obtained) and marked for his attention, has still not been acknowledged as having been received, albeit, we see that it appears on the Planning website. Now what, Mr Pearson? We have heard nothing from you – again!

NOTICE to be sent to all ERY Councillors

We are therefore now bringing this matter to the attention of ALL the Councillors, to ensure that the Swinemoor resident’s views will indeed be considered at the Reserved Matters meeting, despite this item not being included in their Reserved Matters items for discussion.  In this, we are citing the Local Authorities (Petitions) (England) order 2010, which came into force on 15^th June 2010 and we argue that this is not an Excluded matter, i.e. matter relating to a planning decision, (see ref: Citation, commencement, interpretation and application – 2) because there was a ‘systematic failure by the planning department in discharge of their functions’,( ref. Citation, commencement, etc.. 3)  by not hearing/considering/or acknowledging the resident’s views prior to or during the Outline Planning Council meeting of September 2009 and which could have produced a different decision.

We now intend to ensure that this matter is drawn to the attention of ALL Councillors, prior to Council meetings on 9^th and 12^th August, by sending them the following link to our NSH (noswinemoorhospital) blog site,  www.noswinemoorhospital.co.uk

We hope that this time, the resident’s wishes will be fully considered.

Sent from Members of The No Swinemoor Hospital Campaign Group, which includes the Swinemoor Estate Residents Group

NSH’s  Quote: “When complaints are freely heard, deeply  considered and speedily reformed, then is the utmost bound of civil liberty attained that wise men look for” John Milton, 1644

NSH says: If you would like to send your ideas for the name of your new hospital to us (so confident are they that reserved planning will go smoothly for them) we will forward them on to Frank.  You are being allowed to have a say in this hospital after all!!

Sorry, we’re still not giving-up yet!

People take their children and dogs onto Swinemoor, it’s marsh land, not the sort of land for a hospital.

It’s on a busy main road, there will be hospital parking fees, but people will not want to pay for parking and they will park all over the estate – it’s hard enough to get out of Stork Hill Road.

We have a lot of land and a lovely old house at the Beverley Westwood Hospital, why not refurbish what we have already, instead of building more studio flats everywhere on every spare bit of land?

If the council have so much money to waste, how about a cinema or bowling alley- more things to do for the kids in Beverley.

My answer to Mr I Scaife of Goths Lane: we do have a minor injuries department in Beverley and a physiotherapy department.

We could use the money to make the hospital we have better instead of using Swine-moor Land, so there is room for more flats and tiny houses, which will be more desirable near to the Westwood.

Mrs M D Collins, Storkhill Road, Beverley

Letters: Beverley Guardian - Friday July 30^th, 2010

In this article Ivan Ellul is quoted as saying:

Our public engagement events have been well attended and suggestions from these have been incorporated into the final design for the hospital.

NSH would like to ask Dr Ellul, how many of these public engagement events were held in Driffield?

The public consultation events held by the PCT prior to applying for outline planning permission took place in June 2009. You can decide for yourself whether you think this is adequate.