Allotment holders fight to survive
LANDOWNER WANTS TO SELL... BUT NOT TO THEM
DOZENS of passionate allotment holders are set to be kicked off a Derbyshire site which has been lovingly cultivated for more than 100 years.
The Starkholmes Allotment site, on the outskirts of Matlock, is thought to have been set up for use by returning service personnel after the First World War as a method of rest and rehabilitation.
However, the private landlord of the 36-plot site has set a date to evict the allotment holders – with the plots to be vacated by Thursday, September 29.
Allotment holders are now in “survival mode”, they say, and are calling for financial and political support to help them compulsory purchase the site from the landowner.
Campaigners have been lobbying Sarah Dines, Derbyshire Dales MP, and Derbyshire Dales District Council for support in their lastditch efforts. They are also creating a “fighting fund” of £55,000 to help with the compulsory purchase reports, legal costs and payment for the site itself. They have so far raised £4,400.
Brian Newton, the private owner of the site, has been approached for comment but has not yet responded.
Mary Derrick, one of the campaigners, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “This is the last chance saloon for our allotments. It is an absolute travesty that one man can destroy this community asset in the face of the climate emergency and cost of living crisis.
“The council need to show their true and sincere commitments to policies they have voted on and be brought to account. All we need is a chance to buy the site and a chance for the landowner to leave a legacy for his community. Derbyshire could be paving the way for all allotments under threat in the UK. This has not been done before.
“Imagine the precedent that could be set in Derbyshire. Wouldn’t Sarah Dines and Cllr Garry Purdy (Derbyshire Dales District Council leader) want a piece of that?”
The allotment holders have been offered land next to the existing site, which is currently a play area owned by the district council, but this has been firmly rejected by the campaigners. They say 100 years of work to cultivate the current allotment site, such as the intense enrichment of the soil, is not transferable.
Ms Derrick said: “The outcome of public consultation on the adjacent land owned by the district council is that the public do not in effect want to lose two community assets at the hands of the landowner of the allotments. “There are no other identified alternative sites in Starkholmes village. We have not been successful in our attempts to enter into negotiations with the landowner to buy the site for the amount the landowner hopes for, we don’t know what he hopes for, he hasn’t said and he hasn’t agreed to sell it to us – we have asked him to.
“We can’t apply to Lottery Funds if he won’t agree to sell it to us. For all those reasons, the only option left to us is a CPO (compulsory purchase order).”
Campaigners claim the private landlord has suggested that the site’s land value would be £17,400 if it is classed as agricultural land or £1.68 million if it is to be sold as land to build homes on. They also say housing permission would likely not be granted on the plot due to its incline and the presence of numerous mine shafts.
On the campaign group’s Crowdfunder page, it says: “The UK has declared a climate emergency – it would be a travesty to allow this established nature haven to be destroyed.
“We are a group of allotment users – younger, older, parents, children, retired, working, living with all the usual stresses of life – who simply want to grow our own food, quietly, courteously and in harmony with nature, as those before have done, and to leave the soil to those that come after.”
The campaign says Matlock Town Council has given the group £5,000 to help in their endeavours.
Councillor Purdy said that there are currently two “twin-track legal battles” being pursued: the campaign group’s compulsory purchase order and a push from the council itself to formally designate the site as an asset of community value, aimed at protecting it from development.
He said: “We have served notice on Mr Newton to take over Mr Newton’s land as an asset of community value. There are two twintrack legal battles and Mr Newton says he will appeal that (the asset of community value plan). We have set a meeting between the group, the town council and officers to help allotment holders move forward, but as far as helping to fund their campaign, the budget has already been set for this year and I don’t think we have the money.
“A separate site could have solved things and at the moment we have got an impasse. I fear the only people that are going to win out of this are the legal people.”
Derbyshire could be paving the way for all allotments under threat in the UK. This has not been done before. Mary Derrick