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| Dave Hodgson, Mayor of Bedford Borough |
An email to Dave Hodgson, Mayor of Bedford Borough:
"Dear Mr Mayor,
It is now over a month since I wrote to you and I have not
received your reply. If there has been a technical hitch then I would be
grateful if you would forward your email or send me a copy of your letter, and
I should like to apologise for having thought ill of you. Otherwise I would be
grateful for the courtesy of your reply please.
It is a common occurrence for me to have to chase the Council
for replies to my correspondence (this is the second such email today). I
wonder if you can understand the frustration and irritation a member of the
public might feel when they do not receive a response to correspondence. Some
time ago now, in an effort to understand and improve communications I wrote to
ask what the Council’s customer care policy was when replying to
correspondence. The document that I received and kept states that an
acknowledgement should be sent within three days if a full answer was likely to
take longer, and that a full answer should be sent within ten days.
The Council has some fine customer care and public rights of way
policies but it seems to me that it’s nothing to be proud of if the policies
are not upheld.
The purpose of my correspondence and actions over the past few
years has been to improve the public rights of way network in the Borough. I
have not been successful. Numerous paths still cannot be used because even
though the published policy (as contained in the ROWIP) is to open them, the
priorities and actions have not been to do so. If I was convinced that you were
interested in public rights of way, and if you had the budget that you would
wish for, then I could be sure that our public rights of way would be in better
shape and it would be a network to be proud of. Bedford could strive to become
a Walkers Welcome town and borough http://www.walkersarewelcome.org.uk/
and the public and business could reap the benefits. It seems to me that
as a portion of the Council’s budget and compared with the returns of the
investment it would not require much more to noticeably improve our public
rights of way.
You could make a start, if you haven’t already, by taking a
closer personal interest in public rights of way. I feel that public rights of
way needs a ”champion” – an elected member to ensure that the Council has the
will and sufficient resources to carry out its legal duties as the Highway
Authority and the Surveying Authority. For instance, in my opinion there is a
vital need for a Senior Definitive Map Officer with at least one assistant to
oversee and implement some of those duties. If the Council is not prepared to
up the ante in securing a better than average Definitive Map Officer then it
will not reap the benefits I talk of.
In addition to my question below [contained in my email dated 8th January], I should like to ask if you
will do more to have our public rights of way improved, at least to a standard
required by law and consistent with Council policies, and to seriously and
urgently take into account the likely effects of the 2026 cut-off date given
that there are numerous unrecorded rights of way in the Borough, and given that
the Council currently only has a temporary (short term) definitive map officer?
Yours sincerely,
Brian Cowling
OSS Local Correspondent, Bedford Borough
website www.oss.org.uk
The Open Spaces Society is
a registered charity (no 1144840) and a company limited by guarantee,
registered in England & Wales (no 7846516). "
