On The Level

As a result of this, opposition councillors voted to send the decision back to the environment cabinet member, Councillor Pete West, for reconsideration.

The Brighton Society hopes this is a mere formality as the scheme has already been formally approved at the environment meeting on July 5.

The council has, for more than a year, been carrying out an expensive and meticulous consultation exercise, sending out information on the proposed alternative scheme for restoration of The Level to 23,000 households.

This exercise resulted in residents voting nearly two-to-one in favour of creating a new skatepark in the northern section of The Level.

This surely provides a clear mandate for the development to go ahead, so it is surprising to see opposition councillors attempting to obstruct the scheme at this late stage.

The council has always considered that, in terms of planning objections, individual submissions always outweigh petitions.

Petitions can be signed without much thought and many people signing petitions may not even live in the city.

On the other hand, residents who took the trouble to respond to the council’s public participation exercise for The Level would have taken time to consider the alternatives and provide their views on the proposals.

The Brighton Society is concerned that the actions of councillors may well cast doubts on whether the Heritage Lottery Fund awards the £2.1 million grant.

The HLF has been very supportive of the application but the process has already been delayed many times.

For councillors to try to delay the application even further, and effectively ignore the results of their own expensive and thorough consultation process, could result in the HLF reconsidering its support.

And residents will certainly feel cynical about participating in any such consultation process in the future if they see that the majority view can be ignored by councillors.

Malcolm Dawes, The Brighton Society