Judge slams Milton Keynes Council for making Blakelands resident “prise” information out of it

In a ruling issued today (Thursday) the general regulatory chamber tribunal, which looks into information rights, has handed a victory to former Milton Keynes resident Linda Wardlaw.

Ms Wardlaw and the Blakelands Residents Association have been trying to get to the bottom of why Milton Keynes Council gave permission to a giant 18m tall warehouse being built behind homes in Yeoman’s Drive.

Judge David Thomas and tribunal members Anne Chafer and Paul Taylor have given MK Council 28 days to release all the information that Ms Wardlaw has been requesting.

The council leader has repeated an apology to residents over the way the council dealt with questions which “made it look defensive and like we had something to hide”.

In a verdict described as “damning” the council’s practices were slammed as “unsatisfactory”.

Ms Wardlaw was told that emails from a planning officer were deleted and could not be recovered.

Witness statements of two senior council officers were described as begging “as many questions as they answer”.

And information that should have been disclosed to Ms Wardlaw had to be “prised” out of MKC despite it being important to the public to release it.

Ms Wardlaw welcomed the ruling in the appeal which was against the council and the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Ms Wardlaw said: “The residents of Blakelands deserve the truth and this judgement makes very clear that the council has obstructed our access to information and ultimately the truth.

“It is simply unacceptable, as the judge states in his findings, that information has had to be “prised” out of the council.

She added that: “These are very serious issues that must now be investigated by external auditors or the police.”

Cllr John Bint (Cons, Broughton) welcomed the judgement and reiterated opposition calls for an external “professional review” of this and similar planning applications.

He fears that an attitude of obstruction pervades the council from the bottom to the top.

“There is a deep-seated problem of transparency that is in multiple levels of the organisation,” he said.

Council leader Pete Marland (Lab, Wolverton) repeated an apology he made to residents saying the council “should have done better in how it kept its records.”

He said: “I’d like to repeat my apology on that, and the also one I gave that too often the way the council dealt with residents asking questions made it look defensive and like we had something to hide.

“I don’t think there is anything to fear from the truth but incidents like this haven’t helped build trust.”

He added that things like this “don’t help build confidence” that the planning decision was legal and sound.

“It does show the council could have, and should have done better, in many respects before and after the decision and I repeat the apology I’ve already given to residents.”