RECREATION AREA (HOUGH) (Hansard, 20 December 1973)

§ Mr. John Biffen (Oswestry)
On the motion for the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 1, I am very pleased to raise the subject of the provision of a recreation area in the parish of Hough. I should say at the outset that I am raising this topic at the request of my right hon. Friend the Member for Nantwich (Sir R. Grant-Ferris), in whose constituency this parish falls, for it is essentially a matter concerning the Hough Parish Council and the rural district of Nantwich and in no way touches upon the interests of Shropshire or of the Oswestry constituency. I am indebted to both the chairman of the Hough Parish Council, Mrs. Brereton, and to the representative of Hough on the Nantwich Rural District Council, Mrs. Hill, for the background information that has been given to me on a topic which has caused, and continues to cause, widespread concern in the locality of Hough.
1754 The background of this problem is fairly simply this. Hough Common, which is approximately 4 acres in area, was once used as a tip by the Nantwich Rural District Council and was acquired by the Hough Parish Council under the Commons Registration Act 1965. Since Hough is a village which is scheduled for growth under the county plan, it is not surprising—indeed it is appropriate—that there was a decision by the parish to seek to use this common land, which hitherto had been somewhat unsightly, as a recreation area to provide amenities which would be commensurate with the expected growth of the village. A plan was devised, costing approximately £7,000, which would have as its objective the conversion of the common into a first-class recreation area. What has led to this subject now being ventilated on the Floor of the House of Commons is the tangled and frustrating story of the relationships between the parish and the Nantwich Rural District Council.
In March 1972 the clerk to the Nantwich Rural District Council, as a result of representations that had been made from the parish council, offered to carry out work to improve the appearance of Hough Common under the special Environmental Assistance Scheme. A site meeting was therefore held on 16th April involving representatives of the parish and the deputy engineer of the Nantwich Rural District Council. As a consequence, a scheme was approved by the finance and general purposes committee of the rural district council at its subsequent meeting in May. A further meeting was held on 18th August 1972. In part, ostensibly because the council engineer and surveyor would not be able to supervise the scheme, he being—so it was, I am sure, quite correctly alleged—too busy on the problems of local government reform, a landscape consultant was employed to do the job.
A most important point in the catalogue of events is the meeting that subsequently took place attended by the clerk of Hough Parish Council, the deputy clerk of Nantwich Rural District Council, the deputy engineer and the landscape consultant. Notes of that meeting were made by the clerk of the Hough Parish Council. They indicate that she was under the impression that the Hough scheme had not been altered in any way 1755 from the original proposals which would have improved the totality of the common and that the scheme as originally conceived would be executed for the sum of £7,690. The clerk of the parish council wrote to the rural district council on 25th August confirming such an understanding.
However, in January 1973 the parish council learned via the contractor that work was being carried out on only part of the common land which had originally been involved in the scheme. There was a local reaction that work of this character on that limited area could not conceivably merit the proposed expenditure of upwards of £7,000. The deputy engineer was therefore contacted and he then informed the clerk of the rural district council that further work was needed to bring the scheme into line with that which had been originally agreed. The clerk riposted that the parish might be expected to bear additional expenses incurred. Then followed correspondence, part of which was a letter of 27th March written by the parish council in which the comment was made that The work that has already been undertaken is certainly not in accordance with the plan submitted and definitely does not warrant the cost involved. The story thereafter is one of fruitless correspondence between Hough Parish Council and the clerk of the Nantwich Rural District Council. I am informed that the chairman of the finance and general purpose committee of the rural district council declined to put the matter on his committee's agenda on the advice of the clerk of the council.
On 5th April 1973 a delegation from the parish visited Nantwich Rural District Council offices. It sought in vain to gain audience with the clerk. On 6th April the Hough Parish Council wrote to the Department of the Environment at its Manchester office. It said that the scheme as it was being executed was a waste of public funds. Continued attempts were made to have the matter discussed by the rural district council. The clerk advised the chairman of the council not to have the subject put on the council agenda.
On 15th May the landscape consultant, Mr. Blayney, met the parish council. When confronted by its representations, he said that the work could be extended to cover the area as originally conceived 1756 by the parishioners. He said that the work would have to be hurried along because the grant expired on 30th September.
I am sure it will not come as a totally shattering revelation to my right hon. Friend the Minister when I say that there was spasmodic work during the summer. On 4th October the deputy engineer of the Nantwich Rural District Council informed the chairman of the Hough Parish Council that the scheme would not be completed and that the landscape consultant had been criticised by the clerk of the rural district council for issuing instructions to the contractor to carry out work which did not have the formal approval of the council.
The Hough Parish Council complained again to the Department of the Environment. It said that there had been a waste of public funds. I have not been able to give to my right hon. Friend a full and documented history of all the frustrated attempts by the Hough Parish Council and by the rural district council representative to have the facts debated fully and fairly within the Nantwich Rural District Council.
The present situation is almost Gilbertian. Half the site which was within the ambit of the parish council's original scheme is levelled, drained and seeded. The other half is in a somewhat dilapidated state. The rubbish and scrub has been removed, but there has been no infilling, no levelling and no drainage; no fence has been erected. It was an integral part of the scheme to make it a satisfactory recreation area. The siting of the proposed fence is wholly inappropriate and is a matter of mockery within the village.
There is at stake substantial local resentment and indignation. There is indignation that the Department of the Environment should not ensure that upwards of £7,000 has been properly spent. There is understandable indignation, which is tinged with anxiety that the Department should not ensure that the Hough parishioners should get a scheme for a recreational area that the parish council had originally envisaged and countenanced. The parish council says that there should be a full-ranging inquiry to satisfy not merely the council but the taxpayers that the money will be directed 1757 to the purpose that was originally intended.
It was often argued that much of the underlying strength of this country lay upon the potential of each village having its Hampden and being able to produce someone who would argue for the libertarian issues as Hampden argued in this assembly generations ago, but in this instance we have not only village Hampdens but village Gladstones who want to see public funds used prudently for the purpose for which they were truly intended and who are confronted on a small scale with the misapplication of funds. They have evidence of a local but easily identifiable issue which is of national concern—namely, that in the days when so much money is voted for public use it should be most effectively disposed.
I hope, therefore, that when my right hon. Friend answers the debate—I know he cannot answer the whole range of questions implicit in what I have said—he will indicate that the Department is aware of the grave anxieties that are felt in the parish about public moneys not being devoted as they most appropriately should be devoted and about the benefit to the villagers not being as they expected. In that sense I am delighted to raise this topic on behalf of my right hon. Friend the Member for Nantwich, and I look forward to the reply of my right hon. Friend the Minister in a reasonable state of expectation.

§ The Minister for Local Government and Development (Mr. Graham Page)
This matter is very apt for an Adjournment debate in that it is one of local concern yet has within it a considerable amount of principle. My hon. Friend the Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen) has expressed anxiety on behalf of Hough Parish Council that in its view the scheme that has been carried out is not the scheme that it considered was originally authorised. I understand that the parish council alleges that there has been maladministration and asks the Department of the Environment to ensure that an inquiry is held into what is alleged to have gone wrong.
In a debate of this sort one hears only one side of the case, and I must 1758 rely for the facts on what my hon. Friend says, but there may well be an explanation on the other side by the Nantwich Rural District Council. It is sad to find at the root of the problem a dispute between a rural district council and a parish council. In our reform of local government we have relied to a great extent on the grass roots of the parish council bringing forward the feelings of its people to the larger local government unit, the district council. It is disappointing when bringing forward the feelings and views of the parishioners results only in a dispute between the two local government units.
The facts as I know them are scanty, and my hon. Friend has filled in many of them for me. I understand that the scheme was for tidying up Hough Common. It was submitted by consultant architects on behalf of Nantwich Rural District Council, the body responsible for the work being carried out. It was submitted to my Department under the special Environmental Assistance Scheme, which is the rather more formal description of Operation Eyesore.
What we are talking about here is one of the items in the great scheme of Operation Eyesore which has brought so much satisfaction to the country in clearing up untidy land and eyesores. It has been tremendously successful throughout the country—in fact, so successful that we could no longer leave it as an open-ended matter for local authorities to carry out, because the scheme was running away with the expenditure. However, it has achieved much throughout the country and I wish that this scheme which we are debating had had the success that others have had.
The scheme, as the Department understood it, consisted of site levelling, clearance of scrub and undergrowth, the clearing of trees, seeding and drainage. That was approved under Operation Eyesore for a grant on 31st August 1972. The total cost which was approved for grant was £7,790. I think my hon. Friend mentioned a figure of £7,690. On that sum of £7,790 approval was given for a grant of 75 per cent. That is the normal grant under Operation Eyesore. The grant was payable only in respect of those items which I have mentioned, not for any specific future use of the common but just for carrying out work under those items.
1759 The rural district council was, of course, responsible for the scheme. So far as the grant is concerned, the transaction was between my Department and the rural district council, and the grant was payable to the rural district council. We knew nothing of the arrangement between the parish council and the rural district council or their expectations. Indeed, I do not think we would have been right to look behind the request by the rural district council for this grant. The members of the rural district council were the people responsible for putting up the scheme to my Department, and it was to them that my Department was responsible for paying the 75 per cent. grant. So far as we are aware, the work was completed by 30th September 1973. That was when Operation Eyesore came to an end and the time by which the work had to be completed in order to qualify for a grant.
We received the certificate of the rural district council that the work for which the grant had been ready to be paid had been completed. Having that certificate from the rural district council, we paid the grant. So far as we knew from that certificate, the work had been carried out in accordance with the plans which we had approved in offering the grant. It would have been very difficult throughout Operation Eyesore for the Department to go and examine every scheme to see that it had been carried out in accordance with the application and in accordance with the offer of grant. It would be quite impossible to staff an operation of that sort. So we have to take, as I think we are safe in taking in 99.9 per cent. of the cases, a certificate by the responsible local authority to which the grant is to be paid.
I can understand the indignation of the parish council that the money has not, in its view, been properly spent. But the question here is not what the parish council was promised or understood it had been promised by the rural district council. The point, so far as I am concerned, is on what we had offered the grant and whether that work has been carried out.
My hon. Friend has put a doubt in my mind as to whether there may have been some mistake over the certificate granted that the work had been completed 1760 and whether, as a result, in relying on that certificate, we paid money for work which was not done in accordance with the first application for the grant and in accordance with what we thought we were paying the money for. To that extent I shall ask the rural district council whether there is any justification for the allegation that its certificate to us was wrong and that it has collected money wrongfully from us.

§ Mr. Biffen
When my right hon. Friend makes that inquiry, will he at the same time seek evidence from Hough Parish Council?

§ Mr. Graham Page
My hon. Friend has put Hough Parish Council's case tonight, so far as time would allow. There may well be documentation which we should be shown in respect of what he has told the House. But what I do not want to do, and what I cannot possibly say I shall do, is hold any sort of formal inquiry, bringing the two parties together before an inspector, or something of that sort. That is not in accordance with our policy towards local government now.
We do not wish to act as big brother towards any local authority. All we need to do here is see whether a grant, for which the taxpayer has paid, has been properly paid. We have relied on certain assurances in making that payment, and when those assurances are brought into question I must, of course, ask some questions about it. But I could not promise to hold any formal inquiry.
I remind my hon. Friend in passing that there is now going through the House a Bill under which we propose to set up ombudsmen to look into maladministration by local authorities. Perhaps he and I will not be involved in Adjournment debates of this sort when that Bill receives the approval of the House. That might be the right place to raise such a complaint as this in future. At present, however, the Department of the Environment is not a body for inquiring into maladministration by local authorities. They are responsible to their ratepayers for administration in their districts. However, where some process of payment of grant by my Department is involved, if I am told by my hon. Friend that we may have paid it wrongly. I must make some inquiries.
1761 As soon as I have the answer to those inquiries I shall inform my hon. Friend and discuss the matter further with him. I regret that I cannot take it further tonight, and I hope that what I have said will satisfy him on a matter which, as I said at the outset, though a local dispute—a very local matter, for what could be more local than a common in a parish—nevertheless raises a point of principle, involving disagreement between a parish council and a district council.
1762 In future we shall rely very much on the parish councils—not only the existing parish councils in rural districts but the successor parish councils which we are creating—to perform the function of making the people's voice heard, and I therefore hope that we shall be able to avoid disputes of this kind hereafter.