A council leader’s comments about a controversial garden village scheme being ‘rammed down’ the throat of opponents attracted dozens of formal complaints, it has been revealed. However, there will be no standards investigation looking at the conduct of Tameside leader Brenda Warrington, the town hall says.
In response to a Freedom of Information request from the Local Democracy Reporting Service , Tameside council stated that there had been 29 written complaints following the outburst at budget full council in February. Tameside’s legal chief Sandra Stewart had previously said councillor Warrington did not breach the council’s code of conduct in the language used at the meeting.
Coun Warrington had hit back at the ‘Brenda the Bulldozer’ nickname given to her by the Tory opposition over the Godley Green project to build 2,150 homes on green belt land in Hyde.
During the meeting Coun Warrington said: “Godley Green, I make no mistake, I will be on that first bulldozer and that is a promise.
“I will be on that bulldozer that actually starts to dig up ready to build houses on Godley Green and believe me, it will be rammed down your throat. It really will.”
Following the town hall meeting her comments outraged some people opposed to the garden village project, which has garnered more than 3,400 objections. Ms Stewart, the borough’s solicitor and statutory monitoring officer, ruled there was no case to answer.
She said the comments fell within ‘legitimate freedom of expression and need to be heard and understood in the context of the whole meeting’, adding that councillors should be able to express their opinions in ‘forceful terms’.
If a complaint had been upheld it could have led to the member apologising, formal investigation with the standards sub-committee, or no further action. A complainant who feels that the authority has failed to deal with their complaint properly can complain to the Local Government Ombudsman.
Following the meeting, Coun Warrington issued a statement in which she said: “After four years of personal abuse and harassment on this matter, I aimed my comments at those councillors who have been personally abusive, disrespectful and disingenuous in this debate. We are having to build houses on the greenbelt at Godley Green because of government imposed housing targets.”
