Yesterdays flash flooding in the New Invention and Short Heath areas of Willenhall was made worse by Tory budget cuts claims Lib Dem councillor Ian Shires.

Since the Tories have controlled Walsall Council they have reduced the fleet of gully cleaning vehicles to just two. These have to cover the whole of the Borough which has a population in excess of 250,000. This short sighted penny pinching makes no sense as climate change begins to affect our weather claims Ian.

Gulleys are now only cleaned out when a problem is reported. This is abit like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. As a result as soon as there is a downpour drains which are silted up soon overflow and flooding occures.

“I received calls from some most unlikely areas such as Eaton Rise in Short Heath which as its name implies is hardly in a dip.” said Ian.

The usual suspects such as “The Square” New Invention and the walkway from Lichfield Road to Balmoral Drive were flooded in spite of claims by the council that remedial work had been carried out after last years flooding.

Ian has demanded that the issue of climate change be taken seriously and will be raising the issue with the Chief Executive.   

Planning permission for the replacement of Short Heath House was granted at last night’s Development Control Meeting in-spite of demands from local residents for a rethink in order to take account of the imposing nature of the proposed development.

Lib Dem councillor Ian Shires speaking on behalf of the objectors said that residents were not opposed to the replacement of the existing home for the elderly in Sandbeds Road, Short Heath, Willenhall. Residents were concerned about how close the replacement 3-storey was to their homes. Added to this the fact that their homes in Stroud Avenue are at a lower level just makes matters worse.

Councillor Shires said “Back on the 9th July I had a meeting with a Representative of Housing 21 who are to run the new home on behalf of the council. I put the residents concerns to him and asked him to consider a rethink on the design of the home in order to reduce the impact it would have on their properties. He did offer to meet with the residents but as all he wanted to do was discuss the current proposals I could see no point in a meeting and asked him to consider some alternatives which would move the development further away from the back gardens of residents. This he agreed to do. Sad to say he has not seen fit to get back to me.” said Ian.

Councillor Shires said that at no time did residents want to become confrontational over this issue but Housing 21’s insistence in the planning application being determined at Development Control on the 5th August left us with no alternative. We had hoped that the matter could be deferred to the next meeting at the end of August, “Not a lot to ask in the big scheme of things.” said Ian. “Giving time to discuss residents’ concerns and hopefully to come up with a compromise.”

As it is the Tories on the committee pushed for the vote and permission was granted 7 voting in favour, 5 voting against. Residents have been invited to attend councillor Shires’ advice surgery @ 7pm Friday 8th August.