Last updated 19:42, Thursday, 17 July 2008

LOCAL borough and parish councillors are furious that they have been left off a committee set up to lead the redevelopment of the former Broughton Moor armaments depot.

LEFT OUT: People are annoyed at lack of a local voice on Derwent Forest committee

After months of delay the project, now known as Derwent Forest, is finally progressing with the North West Development Agency pledging £1.5 million towards the clean up of the site.

But there has been criticism that a new advisory group to lead the scheme, made up of Allerdale and Cumbria county councillors, does not include anyone from wards neighbouring the site.

Allerdale has appointed its leader Joe Milburn, councillor for Crummock ward, and deputy leader Margaret Jackson, who represents Cockermouth, to sit on the committee with county councillors Tony Markley (Solway Coast) and Eric Nicholson (Cockermouth).

Mr Milburn has defended the make-up of the committee and said it needed to be “small and nimble” to be able to respond quickly to the requirements of the NWDA.

Allerdale council’s scrutiny committee is questioning the decision.

Chairwoman Barbara Cannon said: “The concern is that members feel that they are being excluded from something that affects them.

“If you want a small and nimble committee you won’t alter it by putting one more person on the committee.”

Broughton St Bridgets borough councillor John Arden said all he knew about the committee was what he had read in the press.

He said: “It sounds like sour grapes but I am afraid Allerdale is run by an Alliance and it seems to be a closed book. I may be misjudging them. My email has been down for four days so perhaps they have tried to contact me.”

He said the idea that the committee had to be “nimble” was new to him and he believed that the areas most affected should have representation on the committee.

Scrutiny committee councillor Carni McCarron Holmes said a local councillor should be appointed so residents know their views will be put across.

She said: “All the parish councils had their hopes up. They are now being kept in the dark. These people have put up with a lot of suffering in the past.”

Mr Milburn said the new body would only be looking at processes not policies and needed to be a manageable size.

David Martin, Allerdale’s head of regeneration, said: “Allerdale and the county council will be joint owners of the site.

“This was one way to bring the community issues together. That group would make recommendations. If it sees fit, it can invite local representatives to come talk to them.”

Broughton Moor Parish chairwoman, Kath Ferguson, said the thought of another committee was annoying enough but to have no representation from the areas most affected was appalling.

She added: “The feeling around Broughton Moor now is that they are just waiting for us all to forget about the site and then they will sell it off to someone for open cast mining.

“Do we not have any say on something that will affect our lives? It is ludicrous.”

Camerton parish council chairwoman, Margaret Blythe, said Mr Milburn’s “small and nimble” committee was the first time that anyone had been nimble in reference to Derwent Forest, because so little progress had been made.

But Broughton’s Keith Sproat said he was not worried as long as some action was finally taken. He said he expected the committee would keep the liaison group informed.