An expedient use of the Shaggy Defence

Reading last week’s Advertiser, I see that all this over-development across RBWM is actually the fault of The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Tarmacking Your Drive, Housing, Communities, and Putting Spanners in the Works, known to his friends as Michael Gove.

Cllr Andrew Johnson, or Shaggy as we might now call him, claims ‘It wasn’t me’.

He says he was just obeying orders and the local Conservatives are now being penalised for doing exactly what they thought Michael Gove always wanted them to do.

Apparently that naughty Mr Gove went ahead and drafted the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill (LURB) and it’s really caught Mr Johnson and his crew with their pants down.

Now that is shocking, isn’t it? However, I think he may be talking Curbing Regeneration And Planning (use your own initials)

I also read that Shaggy claims these poor Conservative councillors, having dutifully performed the government’s will and produced their shiny happy Borough Local Plan (BLP), are now being ‘penalised by historical requirements’.

He says it’s not fair, because other lazy local authorities just dragged their feet and are now being rewarded for it.

A bit like in a school cross-country race where a few naughty boys take a short cut and win, whilst the good boys finally finish, panting and sweating but come in well behind them.

Everywhere you look in Maidenhead these days there is yet another block of flats going up, some looking like correctional facilities, others overlooking the local tip and many of the roads are of course blocked with the consequential traffic.

But don’t worry.

He says ‘It wasn’t me’ and the council will now be able to ‘push back’ against those greedy developers.

I guess they must be the same developers that keep offering the council huge sums of money for land on which to build ‘much-needed homes’?

Interestingly, Cllr Johnson believes that the Maidenhead Golf Course is ‘still a logical site’ for homes.

I’ve put that in quotes in case you think I’m making it up.

According to The Advertiser he actually said that out loud!

Interestingly though he feels that sites in Cookham are ‘less sustainable’.

Sites in the beautiful village of Cookham are always less sustainable, aren’t they?

And of course it’s the main reason it’s such a desirable area.

Whereas Shaggy believes sites in the not-so-beautiful town of Maidenhead are still sustainable.

Don’t you wish you lived somewhere ‘less sustainable’?

Meanwhile, opposition leaders are daring to claim it’s all just cynical electioneering.

Well, it’s now March 11 and those pesky local elections are now less than two months away.

So, is it pure expediency on the part of Shaggy and His Crew, or have they really seen the light?

Answers on a polling slip please and don’t forget your photo ID.

Finally, not having been born yesterday, I know what I think.

Please tell the Conservatives what you think on May 4.

Because I expect if they are returned, they will suddenly undergo another change of heart and we will get all those ‘muchneeded homes’ all over the golf course and elsewhere.

MALCOLM STRETTEN

Boulters Lane

Maidenhead