Council fails to review allotment charge rise

A failure by council bosses to review a "gigantic" 465 per cent rise in allotment charges in Cannock Chase has been branded out of touch and mean-spirited.

Cannock Chase MP Tony Wright is highly critical of the rent hike and has been lobbying the district authority for several months to try to force a re-think on the plan to axe the full subsidy for allotments from its budget in the 2009/10 financial year. The scrapping of the subsidy will mean allotment holders will now have to pay the full costs of their plots.

Mr Wright said: "Hitting allotment owners in this way goes against all current thinking by all political parties on healthy eating, outdoor exercise and social inclusion.

"It shows just how out of touch the current administration at Cannock Chase Council really is. In the current global economic climate it would have been a good time for the council to encourage home-growing.

"They have so far been deaf to my pleas, and those of Labour councillors, but it is still not too late for them to have a re-think."

Cannock Chase district has just 70 plots available and a waiting list of 140 people – almost three times the national average.

Mr Wright added: "It is clear from the numbers on the list waiting for allotments, and from the growing interest in gardening, that Cannock Chase Council now needs to seek ways of providing additional allotments. They should review their policy and look into ways of helping people."

Rumer Hill Allotment Holders Association compiled a petition of 21 allotment holders which was presented to a full meeting of Cannock Chase Council earlier this year.

Chief executive Stephen Brown said the council has to balance service provision with what it can afford to deliver within its current budget and certain heavily subsidised functions have had to be self-funding or have been lost altogether.