Can Barratt cut down protected trees?

Delivery_Driver

paddyrg wrote: »

What offends me is that if the first fine doesn't put them off, why the fines do not raise exponentially, £10k for the first, £20k second time, then £40k, £80k, £160k, etc - there will be a point where their wilful and vicious disregard for the law would actually become uneconomic without bankrupting the whole company.

Better still, how about the land being injuncted/planning revoked for 20 yrs. Something they would actually care about.

It is the arrogant bullying and wilful breaking of the laws purely for easy profits that upset me. If an individually wilfully sets fire to their bulldozer they get arrested and prison time, but the company can't go to prison so pays fines out of its rainy day fund. Send a director for a bit of chokey time, this could stop overnight.

I was thinking the same.Blatently and repeatedly ignoring laws like this should lead to a criminal prosecution of directors.That's the only way thy will be bothered enough to make sure it's not done.
It might only be a few trees to them but it's part of our heritage and the way towns are expanding we are already losing enough of our greenery.

Elvisia

ARGH

Just spoke to someone who has actually moved into one of these new homes on the other side of the development, he said apparently there had been huge sycamore trees over there that just vanished overnight. When Barratt were asked they said "oh they were dead anyway" which I find heard to believe as we had a very efficient groundsman who worked full time here, he always went round carefully pruning everything, and kept the place looking amazing. He also got rid of trees that were dead (properly dead) so I doubt he'd have not noticed an entire row of 200 foot sycamores had died. If a tree with a TPO has died then I would assume you'd still need to clear it before you hacked it down.

They've also put in badger runs which seem bizarre - we complained there are badger sets here which were in danger - so they've taken the bottom part of people's gardens and put in a tiny fence, so the badgers have to run along this bit of garden and not stray into the garden. Do these things actually work, because it sounds a bit ridiculous to me? Next they'll be erecting signposts for the foxes to make sure they don't go on the wrong bit of land.

Nilrem

I agree with delivery driver, any repeated offences should lead to criminal prosecutions for the directs - especailly as they can't claim it's an accident when they've paid out specifically for the people to cut down the trees.

Reading this thread reminds me of when some new houses were built near me, they had permission for one entrance to the main road, towards the end of the construction we noticed that they appeared to be building a second entrance across council land, into a tight block of garages at the end of a cul-de-sack (including removing posts that stopped idiots taking their cars onto the field), when we rang the council they had no idea what was going on, and eventually the builders got back to them with the message "it's for fire engines, it'll be locked the rest of the time", which given you can barely get a Transit into the garage area was laughable (let alone the idea the FB are going to carry a set of keys for it).

Elvisia, given the badger that has been appearing in our garden on a regular basis for the past 9 months seems to be able to get round/through a 4 foot high wire fence with ease, I don't think a foot high fence will even slow it - I suspect they'll just climb over it.

VitaK

Elvisia wrote: »

The problem is they bought a large playing ground that have trees around the edges and spinneys. So they said they would not be touching the trees, and they have built just on the open grass area. The issue now is they want to 'landscape' the bits around the edges, so they just went gung-ho and started hacking away, I assume to make it look nice. It was quite bizarre what they were doing, I don't see why cutting down a row of trees exposing someone's back garden looks nicer than leaving perfectly good trees there. So they were destroying habit that had been there for a hundred odd years just so they could put in turf and a few shrubs.

I had heard from a neighbour that he'd seen a list of bribes given to people on the council, but I can't really comment on that as I have no idea if it's true or if he's making idle gossip. Fortunately one of the councillors lives near me and he's furious about the whole thing.

I have no doubt Barratt will keep cutting things down, but I'm pleased finally someone is doing something, because I had a day of wanting to just throw rocks at them. It's so frustrating that someone in your back yard - literally in this case - can break the law and there's so little you can do about it. And it sounds from this thread like I am not the only one.

At the time they gave permission they may not have realised those trees was protected (This happens all to often). Though im sure it would have been an honest mistake, it does mean the council may have very little room to wriggle on, on this matter now. If on the other hand, they knew and the protection of those trees was agreed on, then the council can and should act before it is to late. Regardless, the council are acting strangely slow and not with the power they hold in these matters.

You should involve your MP if there is even the slightest chance that a bribe have found place. This is quite a serious matter and it need to be looked into.

Elvisia

Hi - they did know exactly what was protected and what wasn't, there were meetings (it took about 13 years before permissions were sorted out!) in front of the locals and it was very carefully drawn out what was protected and what wasn't. This is why when I saw them start hacking away that I went a bit nuts. This is aside from the fact they are supposed to get someone in to check wildlife if they cut down anything in the spring and summer months, which I have in writing from our local Environmental Police Officer. A site manager *should* know this, and I suspect he did know it and didn't want to bother. I have also heard that a big wig from Barratt came to look at the site and said why are there open spaces with trees that could have had more housing squeezed on! They're also building on green belt land around here, which is shocking. The development here was not going to go ahead until they appeared to the Secretary of State, who said OK.