Congenital idiot on the rates

Congenital idiot Richard “The Builder” Fear, the city council property boss who didn’t bother getting planning permission for an “eye-catching” CARBUNCLE on the roof of his home in genteel Knowle, is now getting some useful idiot councillors to help him out after losing his planning appeal.

To save him demolishing his unlawful loft extension, the surveyor and RICS (Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors) member – paid TOP-WHACK by us for his supposed property expertise – has now put in a planning application for a ‘new’ extension. This basically consists of a LICK OF PAINT and an extension to the eaves of his house to make his unlawful extension – that should be pulled down – appear like it complies with planning regulations when it doesn’t.

Fear’s latest plan goes before councillors TOMORROW with locals pointing out that, “a PAINT JOB and the addition of tiles to the eaves will not alter the building overall from being what the Inspector described as a “STRIDENT and BULKY structure… in awkward and discordant contrast with the rear roof pitches of the adjacent terraced dwellings”.

Another says, “from the scant visuals provided, it is impossible for us to judge whether the proposed covering of the cedar cladding with white paint will reduce what the Inspector calls a ‘sense of alien otherness’. However, our feeling is that replacing one ‘challenging contrast with the more subtle palette’ of the surroundings properties with a different at-odds colour (white) will simply result in an equally out-of-character and eye-catching interruption to the broader roof-scape’.

Naturally Fear’s planning colleagues at the council are ignoring any locals and their own planning regulations and recommending councillors approve Fear’s new money-saving plans, which a planning inspector confirmed as unlawful at an appeal.

Will councillors agree with this blatant piece of mutual backscratching from their officers as usual or will they stand up for the communities they’re supposed to represent?