Groves has cost Wrexham Council more than £1.1m
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Posts
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Monitor I agree it was the group who started the campaign, however political intervention from our beloved Plaid Cymru and assembly member in the run up to the assembly elections, paint it as you want, ultimately got the building listed and saved, we all know that and that’s why our taxes are funding the Groves. We get the talk from Plaid they have all the answers but in fact, they havent got a clue. Inspector clueso’s the lot of them.
Dear Mr Bailey, if I can recall when Mr Skates got involved with the listing of the Groves it could have been misconstrued he was supporting the listing of the building due to the fact the assembly elections were on the horizon. This was evident when Carwyn and lesley Griffiths joined in at the protest in order bail him out of the mess he dug himself into.The result a derelict building costing all the taxpayers in the county borough and then you have the ordasity to blame the council shame on you.the blame is clearly on labours and plaid’s doorstep.
[quote quote=143507]Dear Mr Bailey, if I can recall when Mr Skates got involved with the listing of the Groves it could have been misconstrued he was supporting the listing of the building due to the fact the assembly elections were on the horizon. This was evident when Carwyn and lesley Griffiths joined in at the protest in order bail him out of the mess he dug himself into.The result a derelict building costing all the taxpayers in the county borough and then you have the ordasity to blame the council shame on you.the blame is clearly on labours and plaid’s doorstep.[/quote]
One trouble with your scenario Derek is that the application to list came AFTER the 2016 Assembly elections so if “ the elections were on the ) it was a recognition of this that led the Labour group elected in 2012 to initiate discussions with Coleg Cambria to make a positive use of the building. If it is my audacity ( sic ) to point out that the Tory- Independent led executive board in November 2014 pulled the plug on that strategy it is ,unfortunately for your argument , a matter of fact. As to Plaid winning the fight in the Council on this I am perplexed as to how their 2 members of the council ( out of 52 ) managed to do this ,especially as neither had great attendance in the last year of the previous Council !
Somehow my full text got lost so I will add two points.
The listing was done post Assembly elections so they were in “ the rear view mirror.”
Secondly the mass of the neglect of the “ empty Graves” fell under the non-Labour alliance (2005-2012) hence the incoming minority administration taking the steps we did to address this situation . It is to their eternal shame that some of my 2012 “ colleagues “ reneged on their 2012 contract with their electorate in this ( and many other ) respects.
Dear Mr Bailey, Thank you for your comments, are you by any chance aligned to the labour party? If I can recall reading an article it was either on social media or the leader paper? It mentioned that CADW declined on a number of occasions giving the Groves listed status because in their professional opinion the building was not worthy to become listed. Then when Ken Skates become involved, lo and behold the Groves was listed. Read into this what you want but when you see cuts in services, higher council tax I’m sure the million pound plus the council have spent on the Groves since listed, would have been much better spent on saving services help keep the council tax to a minimum,rather than on an empty building which the labour and plaid politicians supported in keeping the Groves. In essence that decision is costing us all dearly.
Iu’shigh time that people moved away from personality politics and political point scoring – the reality is that every political party and Independents have at some time since closure been in various forms of power and could have done something to sort out the fiasco.
If the level of emotional passion that was generated by the Save the Groves Group had been in place the day the building became empty then something could have been done years ago. Do sorry to say but this Group has a share of responsibility on their shoulders. Emotion alone will not keep a door open in a community building.
The current Executive led by Cllr Pritchard and co will probably prefer not to do anything and see money wasted in security rather than put a school development plan forward just so they don’t have to thank the Save the Grove or Ken Skates for preserving the ‘White Elephant’.
How can you put farward a school development with the Groves building, it needs to be demolished full stop.surely a brand new state of the art school is the way to go rather than keep a building like this.political point scoring, I think you need to look closer to home. The fiasco is keeping the building which is costing all tax payers money, demolish the building and build a new one. As I said plaid’s and labour intervention has cost the taxpayers of wrexham dear fact.
Derek, I was not advocating keeping the building NOW it is well past the opportunity to convert to a new state of the art complex to educate our future generation of children. My view might have been different when first closed as you only need to see how Coleg Cambria (previously Yale College) retained the frontage of the old War Memorial Hospital- that was at a time when it had only been closed for a relatively short period of time.
What is needed is an overnight bulldozer attack the same as the shameful destruction of the old Sidolli Cafe in Regent Street. If this was a private development the developer would have had the building down by now and be prepared to pay the fine for the demolision as it would be cheaper than the ongoing costs at the moment.
Derek Fisher. You state that the building is ‘derelict’. That is not so, and I as a professional in this field can tell you now, as I stated in the Leader, the School is Structurally SOUND. What is more it DOES meet 21st Century standards and requirements. Speak when you know, not out of ignorance and bias. Now I am done with this backward, pointless thread.
Monitor it wasn’t bias at all. The point is the taxpayers are lumbered with the spiralling cost of the building, you may be a professional in this field however we don’t own the building do we, if the council had other ideas to put a more superior energy efficiency school in place who are we to argue, mine and I’m sure others as well see the intervention of certain political party’s and I’m not alluding you are aligned to them, has cost us all dearly. I may not have the same intellect as you have in your field, but I know the difference between right and wrong.
When you look at the amount of money which has to be saved millions of pounds I’m told, why should people who never attended the school pay in our taxes for an empty building which could have been demolished if it wasn’t for Plaid and labour who supported the listed status. Then when it comes out how much it is costing, the same people blame the Council unbelievable.
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