Has Boris Johnson promised Sidmouth £1.5m funding for its Beach Management Plan? Will Seaton get it too – or is just for constituencies where an Independent is threatening the Conservatives?
The Conservative County Councillor for Sidmouth, Stuart Hughes, tweeted this morning that Boris Johnson was ‘making a pledge that a shortfall of funding of £1.5m to protect Sidmouth from Coastal Flooding would qualify from the £4bn Conservatives have pledged to help address affects of Climate Change‘. This raises several crucial questions:
- If Johnson was ‘making a pledge’ does that mean that all that EDDC, which is managing the Sidmouth Beach Management Plan, has to do is to apply for ‘climate change’ funding – and it will be granted? If this isn’t the meaning, then is this merely a bribe which isn’t really a bribe?
- Will Johnson make a similar pledge for Seaton, whose Beach Management Plan has a similar shortfall – or is this only available for Sidmouth because it’s in the marginal East Devon constituency which Claire Wright is poised to take from the Conservatives? Will Neil Parish press for a similar pledge for Seaton?
- Is this an appropriate use of Climate Change funding, which should surely be used to prevent the rise in carbon emissions, rather than deal with coastal erosion which has been going on in East Devon since time immemorial?
Seaton & Colyton MATTERS 