Cllr Richard Gale Says:
It seems that according the The House of Lords the legal advice given to the council regarding taking three County Councillors to Court for defamation would fail.
The Localism Act would NOT facilitate this, not that the council would have done so in my opinion. When your thoughts and actions are right and honest you must be repared to fight for them and not be frightened off.
Back home in Rutland these three Councillors have all written to the local newspapers to correct some remarks made in the abusive attacks upon them from our MP and Council Leader. We have all received emails from the editor saying, in order to publish the letters, she has cut and edited all three for our approval.
I personally took a lot of time writting my letter and ran it past the solicitors before sending it to the newspaper. It was not a long letter so was surprised the newspaper wanted to edit it. Referring to our key words "Openness and Transparency" I was not prepared for my well considered letter to be edited.
Cllr Richard Gales Unedited Letter
Editor. Councils across the country need to change with not only the new and difficult times we face, but also the increasing public demands for transparency, in all aspects of governance. We, the Anti-Corruption Group are responding to these challenges, but we are the ones who are now being harassed and defamed for wanting nothing more than Openness, Transparency and Accountability.
The media attention focus on our group in recent weeks, solely as a result of needless and very expensive actions taken by the Council (not us) has brought us support from other councillors in a similar position as ourselves from North Yorkshire to West Sussex. We are even being contacted and receiving support from international jurists and legal academics from as far away as Australia and Japan. Therefore, we have to be careful to ensure that what is being said and published is correct.
It is extraordinary that Alan Duncan MP did not take equal care, before launching into the press with defamatory remarks against us, simply parroting Cllr. Begy’s unwarranted attacks. These actions threatened by the Council are unprecedented in legal history, yet I have to confirm that at no time did Cllr. Begy ask to speak to us about his allegations against us, on the contrary, when we asked to meet him, he refused! You have to ask why these extraordinary steps have been taken?
Our latest concerns are about a Section 106 Agreement, that required a local developer to provide 300 affordable homes as part of a greater planning scheme. I am now informed that the developer is going to be allowed to reduce this to approximately half this, why? Further I learn that planning conditions are being “flexed” on combined pieces of land close to the town centre against planning policies. Yet again, without proper information provided to, nor in consultation, with the public or ourselves, why? This is beside the raft of other concerns we have raised which have still not been answered to our satisfaction.
