Council accused over Blantyre school plan procedure

Jun 11 2009 by Chris Clements, Hamilton Advertiser

A GROUP of Blantyre residents claimed this week that South Lanarkshire Council have misled the public and the Scottish Government over plans to build a new primary school in the town.

They say a document they have put together shows that the authority have shown a “fundamental disregard for the integrity of the planning process”. The residents are also calling for an investigation into the council’s local plan process.

The dispute centres on controversial plans to build the new St Joseph’s Primary on Park Lane instead of its existing site on Glasgow Road – a move that flies in the face of the Local Plan agreed with the Scottish Government this year, according to the objectors.

They state that, according to the Local Plan, the Park Lane site had been earmarked for housing development, while the school would remain in its current position.

However, according to the document, the council deviated from the set plan to propose a retail park on the school site.

“Originally we felt that moving St Joseph’s Primary would be unsafe for the kids and would increase problems with traffic. But the more we looked into it, the more we found problems with the way the council have conducted themselves throughout the planning process,” said spokesman John McQuade, whose son attends the school.

The 45-year-old firefighter said that the council had known about the move as early as 2007, but had not been forthcoming.

“In July 2007, the land at Park Lane was transferred from the housing account to the education account, to build the new school.

“However, throughout this time the council continued to co-operate with the government to draw up the Local Plan, agreeing that St Joseph’s would remain on its current site and Park Lane would be housing.

“This means that South Lanarkshire Council were drawing up two sets of plans – one for the eyes of the government and another for themselves.

“So much time and money was invested into bringing this agreed Local Plan, and all the while the council knew that it would deviate from it and use the land for retail development.

“At a time when public funds are under considerable scrutiny with politicians squandering our hard-earned tax on themselves, I am shocked that the council has spent public money and then ignored the findings of the Local Plan within a month.”

South Lanarkshire Council have confirmed that the cost of preparing the Local Plan was £814,430. This figure does not include staffing or time costs.

A council spokesman stated that the Local Plan was developed by a number of parties interested, including the government.

He said: “The opportunity to object to any part of the plan was given and a public inquiry held to examine these objections.

“The inquiry reporters from the Scottish Government made recommendations to the council and the plan was modified before being adopted in March this year.

“The Public Local Inquiry into the South Lanarkshire Local Plan was held in 2007. Development proposals will continue to be put forward which have not been considered during the preparation of the local plan.

“In such situations, development proposals require to be assessed against the terms of the adopted local plan and specific planning procedures require to be undertaken if a planning application is deemed to be significantly contrary to the local plan.

“The planning application for the replacement of St Joseph’s Primary School has yet to be determined and will be considered by the appropriate committee in accordance with the appropriate procedures.”