Banners claims contested
Newark Town Partnership has been accused of incorrectly claiming credit for projects.
The group’s promotional banner says it was responsible for:
l Lightweight market stalls that can be removed at the end of the day.
l Improvements to toilets at the Gilstrap Centre.
l Bins and benches in the town centre.
l Pedestrianisation and street layout changes in Cartergate and Middlegate.
Newark and Sherwood District Council’s external relations committee says that in fact the district council was responsible for the first three projects and the county council for the last one.
“They are saying that they did this, that and the other, when they didn’t,” said Mrs Maureen Dobson.
Mr Peter Prebble said most of the partnership’s key figures and influences were members of the Newark Business Club which, he said, had a well-documented agenda.
This was a reference to, among other things, the creation of a town centre manager post for Newark, which the council does not support.
“It is an incestuous quango.
“I do admire some of their objectives but I am not sure they are the right body to carry them out,” he said.
There was also concern from Mrs Dobson and Mrs Gill Dawn about the amount of money given to the partnership — it recently received £1/4m for promoting festivals and events in the town from the East Midlands Development Agency.
The partnership is made up of councils, local pressure and interest groups, and the emergency services.
Its chairman, Mr Keith Girling, a county councillor for Newark, accepted that the partnership was not directly responsible for any of the things that the banner suggested.
It relied instead on influencing and lobbying through its members the organisations that they represented.
Mr Girling said the partnership had been influential on all of the schemes mentioned, had discussed them, consulted on them and lobbied for them.
He said district council officers decided what should appear on the banner without asking him for his views, so he found it surprising the partnership was now being criticised by the council.
He said there was no intention of discontinuing its use.
