Hands Off Hartlebury Common

I would like to point out the following to persistent abusers of this site,

Malicious Communications Act 1998

Under this legislation it is an offence to send an indecent, offensive, abusive or threatening letter, electronic communication or other article to another person and under section 43 Telecommunications Act 1984 it is a similar offence to send a telephone message which is indecent offensive or threatening. These offences are punishable with up to six months imprisonment and/or a fine.

Your ip's are being logged and you will be investigated by the police.

Steve McCarron

#102: steve mccarron - abusive comments 

 NOT ABUSIVE just because its not what you want to hear.

Police busy enough dealing with idiots like YOU !!!!!!!

#103: - Re: abusive comments

The Police said half an hour ago, and I quote.

"We will send someone around with an external drive, connect to your computer obtain data and process the information at worcester, we will have the IP,s an hour later.

We take this sort of crime seriously if there is a complaint with clear evidence.

Not only is this an offence under the communications act 1998 but we will look at offensive behaviour as an individual offence including harrassment"

"We are able to confiscate machines or devices and or block access to the internet from that address when an offence has been made"

If you want to discuss my campaign, fair enough but I have not injured YOU personally.

 

Steve McCarron

 

Ive sat and watched this comments board with interest, and I can’t help feeling that whats going on is a fairly in balanced argument for those that have yet to make up their mind and are looking to make a decision by gaining more information. Surely leaving the comments against the petition may allow them to make the best informed decision.

Certain comments I know are very misleading, I am talking about the common not being managed for a 100 years. Because anyone with a modicum of conservation knowledge should know that a heathland is formed by grazing the land and this grazing kept the ability of trees to seed the area down, so removing the grazing increase the amount of tree cover. I point to the common across the main road into Stourport as an example where horses are still grazing the land but the amount of trees has not increased. Also given how long the common hasn’t been grazed the trees would have taken it over ages ago yet management in the form of removing saplings at an early age prevents the trees from over growing the area.

The comments about fire hazards are a little out as well given as the council for years has been doing controlled burning on the common for as long as I can remember and again anyone with knowledge of heathland knows that fire helps to regenerate an area of heathland hence the controlled burning. Just because you remove a tree doesn’t mean that the risk of fire is going to increase.

Shade and moisture control by trees is also an error in information because any moisture the trees provide in shade will be sucked up by the trees and their root systems not making it to the smaller plants, which as it happens living on a heathland will have adapted to lower availabilities of water in the soil due to how their roots systems interact with the fact that the water will drain out of the soil quite quickly.

The trees that grow specifically on the common are also non habitat specific and are invasive on the heathland. Silver Birch in particular is a major problem given how quickly it grows and spreads, apart from the fact it’s not actually a native species in Britain it is understandable why the council and many other land managers across the country wish to remove it.

Now I shall move onto the controversial area of Common Land.

“Currently, the general public have no rights to go onto common land unless the land is an urban common, or is crossed by public rights of way (and they follow the line of the right of way). However, the government's legislation in the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 to permit public access to open countryside may now also include access to common land.”

This is a direct quote from http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/HomeAndCommunity/Planning/LandAndPropertyDevelopment/DG_10026177 please go and read as Steve is suggesting for other links he is promoting.

Are also I suggest you read this document http://archive.defra.gov.uk/rural/documents/protected/common-land/common-land.pdf

which is the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) list of registered common land. If you go to page 19 and then go down 14th down you will find the common. If you then read across you will find who the registered owner according to this register is.

I hope that this response is met with some positive response from some (I’m not expecting it from some areas) and that it has given some people something to think about. I also hope that it isn’t removed for spelling or being off topic because it is spelt to the best of my ability and its wholly on the topic of the common. I must also add that I am not a council member or official but a resident of the local area and have been for nearly 20 years.

If it is removed I will simply repost for those that wish to have a read.

#108: -

Thank for your considered reply.

It serves no one to leave comments that are offensive and not constuctive in a debate. Comments that are not related to the topic but are personally insulting.

WCC themselves stated that the common has not been managed or grazed for 100 years. Heathland is not just formed by grazing, it occurs quite natrually in the correct enviroments. I discussed this topic with Francis Flanagan of Natural England. He could not explain why there are open areas that trees have not and will not colonise and the same for the heather. Heather is appearing on the site as new growth but not were there has been recent "management"

There has not been any significant grazing that can explain the commons current condition other than it has created it's own equelibriam. My view and others is that it is a mistake to rebuke this natural, evolved enviroment and create an entireley artificial one. The only benefit of such interference is to those who wish to artificially maintain these spaces. The ecological argument made by Natural England has no foundation in truth and I have yet to be challenged on my opinions scientifically.

 

Back burning was a way of having controlled fires instead of un-controlled fires on heathland, now banned, supposedley 33 cattle on a 200 acre site will do this job. Heathland is a similar monoculture to pine forests which are also  liable to fast spreading, uncontrolled fires. The Dorset wildlife trust lost 1/3rd of it's heathland subsequent to a programme of works as at Hartlebury. Amongst the victims of the fire were deer caught up in the  flames and roasted alive. Their grazing was probarly insuficient. Steve Davis of the Dorset wildlife trust said

"The fire has set us back 20-25 years".

http://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/9078840.Upton_heath_fire_latest__Morning_reveals_extent_of_arson_damage/

This is not in isolation, here

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/latest/2011/05/04/strong-winds-fan-heathland-fires-115875-23106034/

and here

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-11165970

and here

http://www.southwalesargus.co.uk/news/gwentnews/9005239.Record_dry_spell_fuels_heath_blazes/

 

The common theme here is heathland, not forest fires. Fires will develop from to scrub to forest. Not the other way around. Increase heathaland, you increase the risk, it's fairly simple. If you would like to meet me and have a walk around the common I have a ground moisture probe. I can show you that there is sustantially more moisture adjacent and under all the trees of Hartlebury Common than elsewhere.

To say that there is less moisture under trees because the root systems drain the soil is untrue based on my findings. The average moisture count is at least 4-5 times greater under tree canopy with either succulent grasses and or dampleaf mulch.

The attitudes to silver birch are subjective, however thay have a place in our landscape and rhere presence at Hartlebury has not resulted in them dominating the landscape or outgrowing the much slower oaks, again contrary to the information we are being given.

I and others are appearing at the county court, kidderminster, Wednesday, 6th of July at 12.30

If you wish to attend you will see that the council DO NOT own hartlebury common. This is just one of many lies, frauds and deceptions they have made to insure that this scheme goes ahead at all costs.

That is why the injuction against us only restricts our further removal of the fencing, nothing else, no restriction of access to Hartlebury Common, nothing. The council are lying about every aspect of this scheme to everybody. The council are in fact in contravention of prosecutable offences subject to their interference. Even if they did own the common they are in still in serious dereliction of there responsibilities and have broken the law. I have been contacted by Tom Pollard from WCC who falsley claimed that WCC owned the common when he was notified of our intention to start removing the fencing, I have that document in my possesion, yet another fraudulant claim, this time from WCC's legal representative

Not because of ecology but because when they create these frankenstien monsters of habitat, they have to be maintained like that forever.

This is part of a message I sent to Liz Nether

"I would like Liz Nether, Countryside Sites Team Leader of Worcester County Council, to declare how she is fulfilling Articles 8 and 9 of the CBD as set out below and also how she proposes to handle the soil erosion which is already accelerating on the Common. Laying cut birch and tasking rangers to relocate trailers of earth is laughable if it was not so sad and illegal. A member of the public, and others have noticed the decline and erosion and mentioned it too me whilst I was being interviewed this morning by the BBC"

The work is not even being carried out in acordance witht the Rio accord where the funds derive from, which states.

"For the sustainable preservation of natural enviroments and natural habitat in there natural places"

 

I have over 30 years PRACTICAL experience in conservation and restoration. I can spot a cash junket from a mile away, the welfare of the common has nothing to do with this plan

 

Steve McCarron

 

 

 

 

 

 

#112: -

First of all, the council were forwarned specifically by e-mail  that we were going to take the fence down and that they should contact the police with their title of ownership, or to say categorically that they owned the common. This was addressed to Tom Pollard, the councils legal representative. There was an exchange of comunication at this time, he was aware of the position and tried again to warn us off with fraudulant claims to title.

Subsequentley, when the police did turn up that evening, they had been informed by the council. However, they had not been notified of ownership. We were not arrested, not cautioned and after a conversation they were stisfied that it was a civil matter as they had not been provided with any proof of ownership by the council.

Subsequentley, we were issued injuctions to prevent us "Interfering with or taking down the fencing"

If they had title it would have read. " To stay away from the common and associated property owned by Worcestershire county Council, not to interfere with any physical property therein"

This after we took down 250 yards of fencing!

On the 6th of july at 12.30 we will be at kidderminster county court for the hearing into this matter. You are welcome to come along to hear how your council has lied and decieved its way all along to create a cash cow out of public property.

 

I have read the documents you sent me relating to ownership and I am sorry to say that they disregard very real and rights of protection in this land for our commons under the guise of conservation or the enviroment and therefore have no real value.

This will be proved in court and the whole mess will start to come apart.

Thank you for taking the trouble to send a considered question, I would always prefer to give a considered answer. I do not want to fall out with any one but please believe me, the public are being decieved

 

Steve

 

 

#113: steve mccarron - Re:  

 If the council have evidence that they do own the common what happens then ?

If they don't own the common what will happen ?

#114: - Re: Re:

The council do not own the common, being a committe not one person can stop the ball rolling now or wants the responsibility to make that decision, so they keep plugging away, after all they have told so many people that they do own it, how can they stop.

Our group Worcestershire Commons Association will ask for the common to be restopred to it's pre "management" condition. This is not negotiable. As a common it only needs routine maintenece in the future. This can be carried out at a fraction of the cost to the taxpayer per annum compared to the proposed change.

We are prepared for the council to question the above

I will add this direct qoute from the history society in regards to ownership of the common

"In the Medieval period, and possibly earlier, the owner of common land was the lord of the manor in which the common lay. In the case of Hartlebury the Bishops of Worcester. Ownership was then passed on to his legal descendant down the centuries. In 1968 it passed to the County Council and in 1979 was designated a Local Nature Reserve and it has SSSI status."

this is then attached to the above persons comments on the commons and their link to the directgov page

#116: -

It does not matter to us who owns the common and in fact it is illegal for anyone to own it. You can only register an interest. This is subject to a whole succession of acts. The council only has the right to maintain it and maintain free and unhindered access. I do not want to say too much here, just to say the route or information you have presented is somewhat behind were we are now in terms of our progress to see disclosure as it is called.

1955, 1986. these are the times that sssi was awarded. On both occaisions the three plantations at the centre of the common were present as were a significant number of the trees that have been cut down. Why are these formeley protected trees being felled?

Grazing livestock on previously protected sensetive  areas. grazing and walking over iron age archaeology, etc etc.

Why cant you see that this is a commercial enterprise.

 

#117: Steve McCarron - Re: sanity in our open spaces 

 If its a commercial enterprise who will be making money and how ?

the rio earth summit of 1993 was attended by most developing and developed countries. It was to address the problem of mans impact on the eviroment. The key issues were how to mitigate this damage. It was decided that monies donated by the world bank and donor nations would go into a fund to subsidise or help attendees to preserve natural habitats in natural enviroments, ie blue fin tuna in the pacific, the wildlife and ecology of the rainforests etc etc. This would address the problem of exploitation by giving cash to countries to explore sustainable means of reliance on nature.
In this country we were one of the fastest claimants quoting the preservation of heathland as endangered places and species therein. Money would be available as an on going fund to uphold these places.
This is not in accord with the priciples of the Rio aggrement, however by placing cattle on these sites a claim of sustainable bio diversity could be made, in other words a tie in with the need to manage sites up and down the country. That is why, even in Richmond park, all of a sudden cattle are seen as a panacea for ecology.
And of course all this wildlife needs management and observation. So, all of a sudden, huge rafts and tiers of people start to get involved. Consultants, consultant ecologists, consultant tree experts, defra and all there officials, inspectors, rangers and uncle tom cobbley and all. Heaths are brilliant, they do not exist natrually, or so we are told, so therefore they need to be managed for ever and I do mean for ever. Ongoing reporting to qualify for the monies on every aspect of so called natural enviroments is on going but the smoke and mirrors is that they are not natural habitats or enviroments.
That is why without hesitation the exact same blueprint is rolled out. Splitting public opinion and engaging in deliberate and misguided policy. ie, subversive behaviour not befitting public office.
The fences go in, then the cattle and public opinion is quashed, the same story, time and time again, a pattern of behaviour which is strangeley coincidental
Hartlebury Common is just a cash machine, trust me, I have seen it all before.

Steve

#121: - Re: Money

Everybody connected to the enterprise, it is a burgening industry. If you can, watch last weeks dispatches which had this subject as it's topic. You can find it on 4oD, or four on demand on your pc.

Of course everybody concerned will tell you that this conservation goliath is neccesary and why not if you promote your own career prospects with bogus targets and limitless cash available, the whole thing is a self perpetuating fiddle.

My uncle was the uk director of Greanpeace. He resigned from the organisation for the very same reasons when it began to lose its way.

The physical manifestation is represented by the rote conversions of our public spaces and the creation of them into maintenece reliant, unsustainable spaces, in direct conflict with the Rio Accord  which WCC crows on about.

These spaces have never in there histories ever had such intervention.