Tag Archives: Bristol Zoo

PLANNING: THE MAYOR’S PATSY

Westbury
Westbury: “the patsy the council put on any scheme that the mayor wants to go through.”

The recent successful Judicial Review by the Clifton and Hotwells Improvement Society of the planning permission granted by Bristol City Council to build 62 homes on Bristol Zoo’s car park puts a spotlight on the planning officer responsible, Peter “Deemed Consent” Westbury.

A judge agreed that permission for this “major scar on the landscape” was unlawful because it ignored Historic England Advice while Westbury’s report to councillors failed to consider the harm to heritage and weigh up the harm and public benefit.

Westbury also produced and presented the planning report for the controversial “monolithic blocks” on St Mary-le-Port at Castle Park. An application granted by councillors in December 2021. This has now been referred to the Planning Inspectorate by Bristol Civic Society for a public enquiry.

One concern is that Westbury’s report and the public forum at the planning meeting included the support of the ‘Friends of Castle Park’. However, it transpires that the support of the ‘Friends of Castle Park’ is actually the support of one person, Russ Leith. The self appointed moderator and “leader” of a ‘Friends of Castle Park Facebook group, he provided an ‘analysis’ of comments on his Facebook page to Westbury that allege public support for the application.

Word out of Bristol City council’s planning department is that Westbury, who also happens to be an elder at the Reverend Rees’s church, The Hope in Hotwells – enjoys a very poor reputation among planning colleagues. “Can’t administer policy for toffee, we’ve been told and “he’s the patsy they put on any scheme the mayor wants to go through.”

Oh dear

THE TURDS OF TURD HALL

Turds of turd hall

All white! What a lovely picture of THE SOCIETY OF MERCHANT VENTURERS sat on their racist arses sporting self-awarded medals at Venturers Hall, Clifton. But what’s the problem with this private membership club for evil old farts with lots of money? Well, over the last few years, the venturers or their members have:

  • Prevented a corrective plaque going on the statue of their hero, Edward Colston, explaining his role in the slave trade, his religious chauvanism, his political party affiliation and how many children he murdered for money.
  • Venturer’s Trust chair Anthony Browne mysteriously quit in 2019 soon after potentially defaming anti-racist Colston campaigners.
  • Used their unelected role on the council’s Downs Committee to unlawfully allow Bristol Zoo to use the Downs as a car park. Then used a large undisclosed six figure sum of council taxpayers money to unsuccessfully defend their actions in court.
  • Provided a character reference for Alistair “Pervy” Perry in 2016, at the trial of this former Colston Girls School Headteacher, where he was convicted of indecently assaulting a girl
    from his church group in Weston-super-Mare.
  • Until 2016, arranged sick celebrations for children at their schools of Edward Colston’s life. Hosted by the Bishop of Bristol at the city’s cathedral.
  • Public sector looter, First Bus boss, Trevor “Grubby” Smallwood, received an Honorary Doctorate from UWE for “entrepreneurial and charity work”. In 2009 Smallwood had to
    pay £2.7m in Corporation Tax after attempting to dodge the tax via a trust fund he temporarily based in Mauritius. Coincidentally in 2014, UWE vice Chancellor Steve “The Chiropodist” West, became a member of the Society of Merchant Venturers.
  • Appointed Gillian “The Sewage Queen” Camm, a former Director of Wessex Water, as their “Master” last year. Returning to our turd metaphor, Ms Camm earned some of her wealth by tipping shit in our rivers.

Is it time for this gang of self-serving amoral tossers to take Colston’s advice – “Go and do thou likewise” – and drown in the docks?

TOP COP GOES BANANAS AT ZOO!

Outgoing Avon & Somerset Police Chief Constable COLIN ‘DOUGHNUT KING’ PORT thumbed his nose at austerity-hit Bristolians in January by landing them with a tab of more than £4k tab for his ‘gourmet’ nosh-up private leaving do at Bristol Zoo in January.

Port, a former boss of the notoriously corrupt South East Regional Crime Squad (SERCS), left his post as Bristol & Bumpkinshire’s top cop after being told to reapply for his job by new Police & Crime Commissioner SUE ‘PASTIE QUEEN’ MOUNTSTEVEN last November.

Obviously realising that presiding over three Stokes Croft riots in a single Summer in 2011 didn’t help his chances, the fleshy-faced flatfoot decided to jump before he was pushed – threatening wrongful dismissal lawsuits all the way.

No stranger to getting others to cover his bill, Port ratcheted up nearly £15,000 in expenses over the years, including £437.40 on WHITE TIES for posh dinners and £56.81 on malaria tablets – obviously an essential requirement for policing Britain’s tenth largest city.

Bristol’s own Keystone Khief Konstable’s next move is anyone’s guess – though a plum ‘consultancy’ with IBM might be in order, given its involvement with A&S in the abortive privatisation venture ‘Southwest One’.

Best ask Mrs Port – also known as SWO’s Sue Barnes.