The return of the Roedale Terminator

A week ago I had the delight of walking through the steep sided Roedale Valley, with its wild weathered allotments, capturing some of Brighton’s most beautiful scenery. It is set in the country side, surrounded by high trees, where the verdant valley flows down to the sea like a green river in full flood. It is a glorious retreat, far from the maddening crowd, an escape from all the weariness of work and the sounds of the city.

Today the hills are alive with the sound of birdsong rudely punctuated by swearing. They are the epithets describing the Council after reading notices served demanding for more cultivation, giving instructions to repair sheds or to reduce the heights of trees, white plastic labels identifying offenders and perhaps notices to say do not fix notices . They carry with them the threat of termination.

Now two terminators have come; two contracted operatives instructed to identify which plots were not conforming to the letter of the new 12 page rule book, prescribing from on high what good cultivation should be. Remarkably it is much longer than the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which includes the right to rest and leisure and the entitlement in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of rights and obligations. At Roedale the City Council is the prosecutor,the judge and the jury.

Without any consultation with the Site Representative,a notice to repair a shed has been served on a 78 year old female allotment holder, another elderly plot holder was called upon to remove a tree, while most concerningly an elderly widow, who has recently lost her husband with cancer, has been served with a cultivation order. Even a prize winning gardener, with a long track record of good gardening, has been served a cultivation order. She should never have taken a holiday.

There are more such reports of insensitivity and lack of consultation, and certainly no participation; most people do not want to file formal complaints but tempers are running high.

I was told that, at the end of August, the Council sent warning notices of potential termination to over a quarter of the plot holders in Roedale and some suggest that the number may be as large as a half. It is reasonable for the Council to ensure that plots are not going unused and kept in reasonable order, but there is a clear distinction between that and expecting everyone to conform to every line of the 12 page set of rules imposed last year.

Many believe that the rules were unreasonable and designed to impose the kinds of bureaucratic control that I have heard compared to the rules in former communist states. Individuals are often afraid to protest as few can meet the new regulations. Some believe that if they did protest they may be the next to be terminated.

At the time the rules were introduced there was uproar (see Blogg July 2010) and on sites like Whitehawk Hill there was a mass protest. Assurances were given that these new rules would not be retrospective, existing fruit trees would not need to be reduced to 2 metres and that everyone would be given every chance to show that they were tending their plot, before any action took place. This was good sense as the Local Government Ombudsman would insist on due process and reasonable conduct of officials towards the electorate, for whom they are working.

The easy butt for this criticism is the Allotment Officer, but this is surely misdirected. He is someone with an almost impossible role as a middle man between the frying pan and the fire. The Council is insisting on reducing the waiting list for allotments, while no serious attempts seem to be made to allocate significantly more land owned by Brighton for allotments.

The Allotment Federation are friendly people who have no desire to wage war on the Council and their enforcers. The site representatives and the allotment officer are being placed under great pressure to split plots up after 100 years and to undermine the community spirit with the tougher enforcement of minor transgressions in order to reduce the waiting lists.

What is needed is a representative allotment system, where rules are agreed in partnership with many people, where there is transparency on how rules will be implemented and where there is careful consultation with the Site Reps who often know personal circumstances. A new policy is needed to ensure that the reduction of waiting lists is not at the expense of existing allotment holders and new land is made available to those on the waiting list.

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Has the terminator visited you this month?

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