Furious , anybody any advice other than a stiff drink?

Don't get angry. Get even!

Why not get rid of them? Set up a parish council for your local area. You can do it now under the new rules - just get enough signatures.
http://www.createacouncil.nalc.gov.uk/

 

Wow had a look at the link and this deserves some serious consideration taken that the "little problem" we've experienced with our council is just the tip of the iceberg re their failure to provide anything remotely like an adequate service. I'll have a chat with a couple of people who are much more knowledgeable than I re how councils operate or not! and see what they think. Have a few spare days as had to delay (due to the weather) going to Texas by 9 days and now going a route which avoids Heathrow!

 

It would be great if you could get some local people together on this - even one or two might be enough to scare the councillors witless and get them helping you out more.

I mean, the lazy ones are only councillors because they have to be : they work for builders or estate agents or supermarket chains that need to influence planning decisions or businesses that need foreknowledge of council contracts. Or else they're marking time, hoping to get a party political or quango job. Either way, the threat of having a ward taken away might spark them into helping you in their own self-interest. When I lived in leafy Wimbledon, we had estate agents on the council. One of them even said 'there are too many parks in this borough'. Yes, that's why everyone likes Wimbledon. Our road where I live now is just hardcore with a stone chip and powder finish because the local council agreed to the housing without forcing the landowner to sign a contract to finish the road. Fine by me as it discourages traffic! Needless to say the developer was a councillor. He and his mates were such plonkers they sold our sewage treatment capacity to another village for a lot of money, doubtless to spend on some pet project. Inadvertantly they stopped all further development because there's no more sewage capacity, and are left with land they don't know what to do with. These people are not the sharpest knives. They've been voted out now thank the Lord.

As for contacting people: I did some leafletting last year and I was surprised how little time it takes. I was using A5 flyers and I found I could do about do 500 houses in 50 minutes if I planned the route first. I quite enjoyed it; looking at what everyone had done with their gardens.

 

Quick update to you kind souls who have been of such help. Snowdrops which were submerged for weeks have duly died as not a sign and plenty in flower in other parts of my garden. Daffodils are appearing but the leaves are an interesting shade of bright yellow!!! Too early to tell how many other plants have fared. Council have not replied to my repeated request re details as to when they contacted the relevent power companies despite the threat of "freedom of information" so will contact my solicitor on Monday and get advice as to how to make the council respond. The amazing news is that works have finally been completed TODAY. Area around the repair looks like the battlefield of The Somme but after 80 days our road is now open...miraculous! Whether the new culvert works properly only time will tell. Even the big cheese who oversaw the works eventually admitted off the record of course that they had made a complete ba..s up and appologised to my husband. We might even be lucky enough to get our bucket collected again, we have amassed piles of black bags of refuse and there better not be any funny business about taking them once the bin lorry appears again.I'd love to know how much this shambles has cost us council tax payers, many £1000s that for certain.

 

Glad to hear things are looking up in respect of the repairs, but sad to hear you've lost the snowdrops Silu. Perhaps the daffodils will recover, may be not fully this year, but well worth a wait to see how they do next year.

 

Sorry to hear about the Snowdrops. Good time to replace them, "in the green", if you decide to. I have bought from Eurobulbs over the last couple of years and they have been efficient, cheap, and hopeless at counting out the right number of bulbs (i.e. in my favour!!) in case of interest. I used a bulb planter and put 3-bulbs-per-hole so they would make a bit of a clump. The ones I planted last year look a bit solitary, of course, but I reckon by next year they should start to put on a bit of a show.

 

You will be delighted to hear
FIFE COUNCIL are recruiting a new Director
The Salary is £570 pa MORE THAN THE First Minister Mr Salmonela
Who's Salary is £500 pa MORE THAN THE Prime Minister Mr Dough Boy

What a strange world
Glad you have the work done at last

Jack McH

 

Speechless Jack, it's beyond belief!. Guess what was happening all day today? BT were out for the 2nd time repairing their telephone cable which was ripped to bits by beloved Fife Council. They didn't even bother to report the damage either time leaving it to my poor neighbours to report a fault. The 2nd time they damaged the cable Fife Council workers just gaily tarmaced over it. It took BT about 4 hours to locate where the damage was and now have not a hope of repairing it and have had to lay a new piece of cable. The phone cable was the ONLY thing Fife Council could have damaged in the vacinity of the blocked culvert and duly did so TWICE.

 

Thank you Loofah, I really wasn't too sure if I should have posted about our "little problem" on here at all as while having affected my garden it isn't wholey related to gardening per say. I have had a telephone conversation with my solicitor and have a meeting booked for the end of this week. Luckily for me the solicitor is a sort of friend so won't be charging me the earth for a chat. He was actually hysterical at my discription of what has gone on here and it would be IF us rate payers weren't picking up the tab. Upon informing the Council that so far I definitely have lost 1000s of Snowdrops they replied that they might appear next year. That's about as likely as me winning the Miss World competition. I've a feeling that the council think I am going to go away...that will be a no.If you want a laugh, on every bit of corespondence I've received from the council it proudly states "Winners of Scottish Transport Local Authority of The Year 2010 and 2011" I can't think of anything even vaguely printable to comment on this boast.

 

You carry on, we're loving it

Its directly affected your garden & its interesting to see how the run in is developing.

 

we all share our garden problems , I thought that was kinda the point of forums, as proved the point, you got lots of advice on how to proceed legally and loads of sympathy.We lent a virtual shoulder to cry/vent on.

 

And put forward the possibility of you being a Deluge Deity

 

Oh yoo hoo Zigs!
A couple of friends who know the full details of this farce are keen on me writing a mini comedy series for TV on it. There has been episodes of theft (diesel and parts of a mini diggered swiped from the site), evidently a road closed sign is a beacon for those with light fingers and while I was on holiday 1 of the newly laid pipes "swam away" down stream and had to be fished out of the burn by a JCB and replaced.If I ever get round to writing a sketch I don't think anybody would think it believeable!

 

I had a slight chuckle to myself on the way home today. Much of my neighbourhood used to be a council estate years and years ago. Most of it is private now but there are still a handful of housing association houses left. This was obviously seen by some jobsworths a valid reason to erect a ridiculous huge metal sign in the middle of the green, telling us how they were working for us. Its not been there that long, maybe a week or two max, and I noticed today the posts are still in but the big metal sheet has gone. I obviously don't approve of theft, but I couldn't help chuckle at the thought that that particular eye sore has almost certainly been weighed in by now.