Council rejects claims over role in swap meet
The Timaru District Council has further defended accusations it had a part to play in an acrimonious access dispute in Winchester.
The owner of Winchester’s motor camp, Gary Ryan, has levelled legal threats against South Canterbury Vintage Car Club chairman John Foster over comments he made about a dispute over access to its swap meet event.
Foster says the entire dispute could have been avoided if the Timaru District Council had formed an advisory committee to help administer the Winchester Domain. He said on Wednesday the council’s corporate services group manager, Tina Rogers, had pledged at a meeting in August to form such a committee, and believed it was ‘‘taken as read’’ the swap meet’s organisers would be on it.
However, Rogers said it was agreed at the meeting ‘‘that communication with the community would continue and has occurred with the members of the previous committees’’.
‘‘The community are welcome to form an advisory group with a representative as the point of con- tact with the council.’’
Rogers said previous discussions with members of the Winchester community included the operation of the camping ground but there was insufficient local interest for the camping ground to be run locally.
The council later sought expressions of interest to lease the campground to ensure its continued operation.
The advertisement for the lease stated the ‘‘ideal person’’ would be ‘‘conversant with the principles of health and safety’’, and Ryan said on Tuesday he had declined the club’s requests to use a gate between the motor camp and the showground for safety reasons.
Foster said the club’s inability to use the gate had inconvenienced swap meet visitors.
He said on Tuesday he believed his great-grandfather, William DeRenzy, and great-greatgrandfather, Major John Albert Young, who were involved in the establishment of the Winchester Domain, would have disapproved of the predicament the club had experienced in arranging the swap meet.
‘‘The domain is there for the mutual benefit of the people of Winchester,’’ Foster said.