Protesters demand Bridgwater Tesco inquiry (From This is The West Country)
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Protesters demand Bridgwater Tesco inquiry
7:00am Thursday 3rd January 2013 in News
Protesters gathered outside the district council offices in King Square, Bridgwater.
FURIOUS campaigners have called for a public inquiry into Tesco’s bid for a giant Bridgwater supermarket after it emerged that taxpayers’ money has been used to process the planning application.
The Mercury has reported how Somerset County Council and Sedgemoor District Council, joint land owners of the Northgate site where Tesco wants to build an Extra store, were in dispute with the supermarket over the planning application fee.
The councils believed Tesco owed £47,865, while the supermarket argued that the correct fee was £27,665.
The county council has paid to the district council, which is the planning authority, the disputed £20,200 as a temporary measure to register the application, but it has emerged that no more money will be forthcoming from Tesco.
Protest group Bridgwater Forward, which demonstrated outside the district council offices in King Square in December, said: “This is a scandalous misuse of public money and Tesco should pay it back immediately.”
The group also called for Tesco’s application to go before an “independent public inquiry”, and said people in Bridgwater had “lost faith and confidence” in the district council.
However, a district council spokesman said: “It’s entirely lawful and, indeed, normal practice for land owners to pay or contribute to the fee in relation to a planning application on their own land.
“Until the full planning fee is paid an application cannot be registered, and therefore cannot be available for the public to view and comment upon.
“The suggestion has been made that Tesco has been offered ‘a planning fee incentive’ or an ‘inducement’. This is not the case.
“The full planning fee of £47,865 has been paid. There has been no ‘concession’.
“The fee has not been reduced and none of the fee has been waived.”
A county council spokesman said: “Sedgemoor, as the planning authority, will carry out the majority of the work assessing this application, and Somerset County Council has paid the district council £20,000 in recognition of this.
“If the county council had looked to sell its share of the site independently it would have incurred a similar cost and therefore it’s a sensible recognition of the costs involved.”
A Tesco spokesman said: “The application fee has been agreed with the county council, who are part-owners of the land.”
Comments(25)
Samej1
says...
8:09am Thu 3 Jan 13
Alex Cameron
says...
9:25am Thu 3 Jan 13
Alex Cameron, editor.
awayswing
says...
9:45am Thu 3 Jan 13
g part of Tesco's bill for planning application?If it is usual for SCC to pay towards the expenses of SDC regarding jointly owned land Tesco's quote makes no sense.Does anybody know what is going on here?
twinkles
says...
10:14am Thu 3 Jan 13
"Ok, how much will it cost?"
"£20000..."
"o...k...."
See, although on the face of it, Tesco have done wrong, in reality it's more like the divots 'working' in local government mismanaging the situation. I bet if you looked hard enough there would be many, many other times when money has been left to flutter out of an open window.
grisleyreg
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10:46am Thu 3 Jan 13
Samej1
says...
10:51am Thu 3 Jan 13
utd ian
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11:32am Thu 3 Jan 13
FreeSpeech?
says...
11:45am Thu 3 Jan 13
Samej1
says...
12:08pm Thu 3 Jan 13
FreeSpeech? wrote:Exactly - I've said it before to the pro-Tescos here, be careful what you wish for!
Trouble is once Tescos get a foothold there no stopping them, take Taunton for example we have the main Tesco on Wellington Rd the express not half a mile away another on East Reach half a mile from that, then an express shop on Priorswood Rd plus the One Stop less than 500yrds away which Tescos own not to mention all the other Tesco express and One Stops in the town and all they do is drive out competition. They are renowned for riding roughshod over councils concerning planning knowing full well they will get away with it as the councils are scared of losing and have to pay their legal costs.
Samej1
says...
12:08pm Thu 3 Jan 13
FreeSpeech? wrote:Exactly - I've said it before to the pro-Tescos here, be careful what you wish for!
Trouble is once Tescos get a foothold there no stopping them, take Taunton for example we have the main Tesco on Wellington Rd the express not half a mile away another on East Reach half a mile from that, then an express shop on Priorswood Rd plus the One Stop less than 500yrds away which Tescos own not to mention all the other Tesco express and One Stops in the town and all they do is drive out competition. They are renowned for riding roughshod over councils concerning planning knowing full well they will get away with it as the councils are scared of losing and have to pay their legal costs.
scally666
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6:05am Fri 4 Jan 13
MATT7250
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6:18pm Fri 4 Jan 13
you forgot the one in Lisieux Way and the one in the high street.
And i here the Bathpool pub is going to be an express, and the petrol station at cross keys.
FreeSpeech?
says...
6:33pm Fri 4 Jan 13
MATT7250 wrote:I did say all the other Tesco express and OneStops in the town as too many too list as we also have South Rd, Galmington and God only knows how many more but definitely too many to list.
Free speech
you forgot the one in Lisieux Way and the one in the high street.
And i here the Bathpool pub is going to be an express, and the petrol station at cross keys.
Mark1970
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7:13pm Fri 4 Jan 13
Tesco have expanded too much and too quickly and increased their prices to cover for that.
If say for example Fred Bloggs opened up a shop where Tesco's are it would not work, people would not shop there unless they needed something. The prices would be far too high for most people.
If Tesco get any larger, they will eventually collapse their stocks have fallen and profits have dropped due to all this expansion.
In about 20 years time you will have Tesco closing stores.
Mi_Coc
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8:33pm Fri 4 Jan 13
I used to find them cheaper but watchdog have found many of there role backs are false and I don't see my shop coming in cheaper than tesco or Sainsburys. I think they work on the basis that their core customers are to stupid to work that out now.
Mark1970
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1:34am Sun 6 Jan 13
In all fairness the food that is around today does not taste how it used to many year ago. Too much preservatives and E numbers are in our food, and this is every supermarket.
I can feed myself for about a £1 a day at Asda using smart price or chosen by you products.
20p for instant mash potato will do 2 or 3 meals. Ok it may not sound nice but a bit of butter and milk and it is more than edible, tin of 21p tin of peas enough for 2 days, pack of 56p pigs liver enough for two days.
I fill up at Morrisons usually as it is much cheaper for petrol, but when they done cheaper petrol and special slogans I noticed that the food in store had gone up.
You do get what you pay for, but if you want to pay for quality then really you should use locally produced foods and not massed produced.
The farm shop in Priorswood gave me the best brussel sprouts that I had ever eaten in my life, but they were expensive. Sadly people do not have the budget to afford local produce.
Anyway instead of waffling, all what you need to do is basic maths mi_croc. Divide by 4 so say for example 200 is 50 so who really does that make stupid now?
mansell5
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10:56pm Sun 6 Jan 13
And "when they done cheaper petrol". Thank you, absolutely priceless.
Mark1970
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12:38pm Mon 7 Jan 13
One quote was before the gulf war saying that if we did go to war with Iraq, petrol would jump to 90p a liter.
Bring back peace and harmony in the World and let's have some cheaper petrol.
FreeSpeech?
says...
1:45pm Mon 7 Jan 13
Mark1970 wrote:Petrol isn't that expensive if you take off the fuel duty and VAT so perhaps we should be complaining more to the Government and environmentalists who keep wanting to increase the duty levels........ Bring back the fuel blockades!.
Funny you should mention petrol, I read what happened on this day in this that and the other year.
One quote was before the gulf war saying that if we did go to war with Iraq, petrol would jump to 90p a liter.
Bring back peace and harmony in the World and let's have some cheaper petrol.
Mark1970
says...
2:43pm Mon 7 Jan 13
The first gulf was a puppy compared to gulf war 2 and now Afghan.
We have had to spend billions in arms which has added to what you call fuel duty and VAT.
Apart from a small increase in wage you are not paid much and you claim to be ex forces?
By the time food and lodgings was taken out I was paid about £440 in a month that was not enough for working 12 hour days and having time reduced for being off base.
The kids who are in today have had it much worse than what we did during the first Gulf.
They are fighting for nothing really when truth is told.
FreeSpeech?
says...
3:56pm Mon 7 Jan 13
Mark1970 wrote:Listen berk if for one minute you think that fuel prices will drop if we stop fighting the politicians wars then you are as deluded as you come across, we are being fleeced to pay for our EEC contributions to improve the lifestyles of new members of the EEC whilst our standards decrease, so get off your holy soap box and get back to the subject of Tescos.
Freespeech how do you think that we pay for war? Do you think that we suddenly have a pot of money?
The first gulf was a puppy compared to gulf war 2 and now Afghan.
We have had to spend billions in arms which has added to what you call fuel duty and VAT.
Apart from a small increase in wage you are not paid much and you claim to be ex forces?
By the time food and lodgings was taken out I was paid about £440 in a month that was not enough for working 12 hour days and having time reduced for being off base.
The kids who are in today have had it much worse than what we did during the first Gulf.
They are fighting for nothing really when truth is told.
Mark1970
says...
4:58pm Mon 7 Jan 13
If we had of listened to the EU and not followed the yanks, we would not be at war, we would not have lost so many troops.
Weapons of mass destruction (COUGHS)
Mark1970
says...
5:14pm Mon 7 Jan 13
Most countries in the EU do not pay unemployment benefits such as we do, and people have flocked here to be able to claim them.
I worked with a Romanian girl who when she was sacked, she laughed and said thank you. Now she can claim benefits and be on the dole because she had worked for a year in this Country.
That is what the EU has cost us, because even when these people do commit crimes, we cannot deport them and we are the mugs of the EU.
Your petrol and food prices went up long before most immigrants landed.
The EU is possibly 40% to blame for increasing prices.
Mark1970
says...
5:33pm Mon 7 Jan 13
Still war has the biggest tax rise on your budget, immigrants and the EU next.
If we cut those two out, then no our prices would not drop but they might stay stable.
Fartypants says...
7:53am Thu 3 Jan 13