Labour Group Leader brands MP ‘utterly irresponsible’ over Local Development Plan comments

The fallout from the Local Development Plan vote continues, with Wrexham Council Labour Group Leader hitting back after Wrexham’s MP Sarah Atherton backed councillors who threw out the LDP for a second time.

Last week a majority of councillors voted for a second time not to adopt the LDP, with the issue now set for a Judicial Review if the mystery complainants carry out their threat.

On Wednesday Wrexham’s MP backed the majority of councillors who voted to not adopt the controversial Local Development Plan, with specific criticism of local Labour councillors – who on the night of the debate had “made a collective decision to place a whip on ourselves due to seriousness” of the question before them, adding “we are not hiding from this difficult and serious decision. We will not cast our vote unlawfully.”

Wrexham’s MP Sarah Atherton said, “Whilst the local Member of the Senedd and Labour Councillors criticise their Councillor colleagues for upholding democracy, and representing residents’ interests, I believe those elected Council representatives who voted against the LDP were doing their job.”

Those comments have prompted a lengthy ‘considered’ statement from Labour Group Leader Cllr Dana Davies who has fired back claiming Wrexham’s MP was “clearly championing law-breaking”.

Cllr Davies’ full statement is below…

I had not intended to release a statement on behalf of Wrexham Labour councillors, given that the council is currently at the centre of a judicial review – a legal challenge regarding an unlawful political decision and the most serious challenge Wrexham County Borough Council has faced since its formation.

However, the recent public comments made by Wrexham’s MP, Sarah Atherton, most definitely require a considered response.

An extraordinary meeting of the council was held last week, preempted by the court asking councillors to review their previous decision in April which resulted in the non-adoption of Wrexham’s Local Development Plan (LDP).

The court believes that the decision made in April is unlawful and therefore gave councillors a second chance to review their position with a view to upholding the rule of law. All of the council’s statutory officers, plus three independent legal opinions, also concluded that voting against the adoption of the LDP is an unlawful action. That professional advice was ignored, and 30 councillors wilfully and consciously voted in breach of the legislation after receiving confirmation from the legal officer that they would ‘not go to jail’. The legislation that details the LDP process and the examination for soundness is enshrined in UK Government planning law.

While Labour councillors have a number of concerns regarding some elements of the LDP, we know there are solutions within the process post-adoption to fix these issues. Much of our local supplementary planning guidance is out of date as most of it was developed in 2005 to support the implementation of the previous Unitary Development Plan (UDP) that expired in 2011. So, for past 12 years, Wrexham has had no strategic plan, and we have all experienced uncontrolled development across our county borough during this time.

What Labour councillors, along with others, actually voted for last week is to respectfully uphold the law. We believe a key principle of democracy is to do just that, otherwise you end up with dictatorship. If decision-makers continue to ignore the law, at what point does that affect services that you and your family need and rely upon? How do you fight against that injustice, and will you have the funds required to pursue the necessary legal recourse?

I am shocked, although sadly not surprised, that our current MP for Wrexham is clearly championing law-breaking, given that one of Ms Atherton’s key responsibilities as your elected representative is to legislate. A lawmaker advocating for law-breaking and publicly attacking other elected representatives for upholding the law is, in my view, utterly irresponsible.

As Ms Atherton’s personal views certainly look to be in direct conflict with her job description, is her position as a Member of Parliament now untenable?