Full Council – The Awards for most Ridiculous Arguments

Well if you’ve read the previous entries on the full Council meeting you’ll not be surprised to hear that the Tories have a clean sweep.

In third place

The Tories on speed (no not that kind of speed).  During the Manydown debate the Tories accused the opposition parties of being to slow in raising the Manydown issue.  Manydown had been considered a suitable, achievable and available site through the evidence gathering stage (last two years).  It was taken off the menu sometime in the summer and the first we knew about it was at the Planning and infrastructure committee in September and a motion was moved in the next Council meeting in October – we could not have done it quicker!  To prove this point a Tory colleague joined the debate and accused the opposition of jumping the gun.  So the opposition were too fast, too slow and couldn’t have been quicker.  Only a local Tory could argue that one with a straight face.

At number two

The Kempshott Tories opposing the development of Down Grange by opposing the opposition to it!  The motion was simple – ask the Tory County Council to not offer the site they own for development.  The Tories said this was a silly idea and the best way to oppose development was to join the pressure group and not tell the County Council.  A sort of high profile secret campaign.   Really don’t get how that works.

The Winner

Had to be Manydown.  In full Council one of the Tories best debaters met his match.  It was himself.  He argued that Manydown was not suitable for development because, amongst other things, the railway line and two ancient monuments stood in the way. 

Later in the meeting he spoke again about his belief that Manydown would be developed one day when the barriers had been overcome. 

So unless, at some point, in the future the railway line sort of vanishes or someone  invents a clever way of bridging over it.  (Perhaps they could call it a bridge) it is a no go.

As for those ancient monuments well, until they get less ancient or monumental a few years from now we can’t consider this site yet.

The Tory argument is - it is impossible to develop Manydown now, but they’re sure we can in the a few years when nothing has changed!

If the local Tories are on a mission to look silly, you’d have to say they’re doing very well.