CANTERBURY APPLIES FOR LARGE CASINO

By Alex Perkins, Canterbury Liberal Democrat Leader

 

City councillors and church groups in Canterbury are fuming following a last minute application by just 8 Conservative members of the City Council’s Executive for the cathedral city to host a large casino. The decision, which was rushed through the City Council Executive by Conservative councillor John Gilbey, means that Canterbury is now in competition with several other councils in the region to host a gamblers’ paradise.

Church groups, the cathedral authorities and other local organisations have had no chance to comment or express possible doubts about the prospect of a large casino in Canterbury, because the council sat on the application since November last year.

“The request for permission to have a large casino built in the Canterbury area was added to an Executive agenda (for the 28th March meeting) at the last minute, and no-one other than the eight Conservative councillors on the City Council Executive had the opportunity to comment,” said LibDem opposition leader Councillor Alex Perkins. “There has been no public consultation, and as they held the report back until the last minute no-one has had a chance to test the proposal in public, or to seek assurances as to the size and location of the casino. They won’t tell anyone which sites they are considering, so for all we know it may even be close to the cathedral or another important heritage site.”

Normally any Executive decision can be “called in” for scrutiny by the cross-party Overview and Scrutiny Committee which is chaired by Councillor Perkins. However on this occasion Councillor Gilbey failed to bring the report to the Executive until 3 days before the deadline for submission to the government (31st March), and so council lawyers were forced to accept that any opportunity for other councillors, or groups outside the council, to discuss the last-minute decision would mean the government’s deadline for casino applications would have been missed.

“This is an absolute disgrace and shows the complete contempt the Tory Executive has for other councillors and for the public,” said LibDem Deputy Leader Susan Ashmore. “They have sat on this until the last minute and have used the ‘urgency’ rules to stop anyone objecting. They have run rough-shod over public accountability!”

See BBC report .