zego said:In case you haven't seen what the discussion is about, this (and the current list of names) is what you will find at:
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Falmer/
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We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Help get a stadium at Falmer Brighton And Hove Albion.
Submitted by Stewart Simmonds – Deadline to sign up by: 14 February 2007 – Signatures: 436
Falmer Stadium is the codename of the community football stadium in East Brighton, near the village of Falmer and the council estate of Moulsecoombe, East Sussex, England. It is to be funded by Brighton and Hove Albion F.C. The stadium is currently planned to be a 22,000 all-seater stadium. Whilst planning permission was given by the unitary authority for the area, Brighton and Hove City Council, the Lewes District Council has fought stadium plans extensively. Although the stadium itself will lie completely within Brighton and Hove, the vacant field straddles the boundary with Lewes (despite being owned by Brighton and Hove). Four years after the original plans were put forward by The Seagulls, John Prescott approved the plans on October 28th 2005. Still over a year later, there is nothing like a stadium.
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The discussion (at length) is in "Petition to the PM" started by The Oldman, 2 days ago, when votes were 37.
Rusco said:Err ... where is the Falmer planning reference number, how will they know what to relate this to?
Tom Hark said:It's a piece of incoherent shit IMHO
'Still over a year later, there is nothing like a stadium'
WTF is THAT supposed to mean?
Rusco said:I agree Tom, but sure there must be some sort of criteria for these sort of things to even be considered, isn't there?
Lord Bracknell said:Has anyone given any thought as to how the Number Ten office might respond to this petition?
My guess is that the response will be along the lines of:-
"The matter is currently awaiting a decision by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, who is considering representations made by interested parties. It is not appropriate for the Prime Minister to intervene in a process governed by planning law, because to do so would be to run the risk of a further legal challenge to the Secretary of State's decision".
Tom Hark said:I'm pretty sure the official response will be EXACTLY as predicted by Lord B a couple of posts up
It's all they CAN say really.
Lokki 7 said:What will the response to the new EDM be do you think?
Tom Hark said:I'm pretty sure the official response will be EXACTLY as predicted by Lord B a couple of posts up:
It's all they CAN say really.
Lord Bracknell said:Has anyone given any thought as to how the Number Ten office might respond to this petition?
My guess is that the response will be along the lines of:-
"The matter is currently awaiting a decision by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, who is considering representations made by interested parties. It is not appropriate for the Prime Minister to intervene in a process governed by planning law, because to do so would be to run the risk of a further legal challenge to the Secretary of State's decision".
Lokki 7 said:Which bit?
Tom Hark said:Lord B's bit.
Lokki 7 said:So you are saying the response to the new EDM will be negative then. And the reason not to sign the petition was to keep focus on the (then upcoming) EDM? Hmmm...
Tom Hark said:For what it's worth, I don't think the EDM will do much either. But at least it won't hand ammunition to the NIMBYs by allowing them to erroneously compare like with like with the last petition. And I mistrust zego mightily.
Maybe FFA did miss a trick with the petitions, cos apart from the million signature road tax petition, the next one down only had about 47,000 sigs last time I looked. Getting to second place in the league might concievably have meant something. But not this disorganised shambles that even railroaded the official site into running it. A spectacular own-goal IMHO. But feel free to have the last word.