Sheffield Tree Fellings - Labour City Council Outsourcing Local Democracy to Amey

By: N_Walayat

It may be the start of the new year but t is unlikely to bring a halt to the tree felling rampage currently underway in Sheffield, where apparently by the end of 2017, 6000 big street trees will have been felled out of a population of a about 30,000, big street trees which have been deemed by the councils PFI contractor Amey too costly to maintain and so have to go so as to maximise profit.

In response to the rampage thousands of Sheffielders have been protesting many coalescing across a number of disperate facebook groups in an attempt to both publicise and halt the tree felling's before they claim thousands more of the Sheffield's biggest and best trees. Unfortunately there is little sign that the campaigns and voices of reason have had any effect on the city council which remains determined to allow Amey to fulfill its objectives regardless of the damage being done to Sheffield's streets. The reasons for which are shrouded in secrecy as to why Sheffield city councilors appear deaf, dumb and blind, which implies that the councillors have out sourced the running of Sheffield to a foreign multi-national, the Spanish Ferrovial family owned Amey.

Which means that the Labour Sheffield city councilors have effectively out sourced themselves out of a job, betraying all those they purport to represent instead having handed power over to a foreign multinational to dictate what happens on Sheffields streets. Whilst many of the tree campaigners remain unwilling to recognise the fact that it is a Labour council that is doing this to Sheffield, tending to respond that it has nothing to do with politics despite the fact that it is ALL ABOUT POLITICS!

I first became interested in what was happening to Sheffield's street trees some 2 years year ago, given that unlike most I recognised the impact that the loss of capital value of felling big mature trees woul have on property prices that some web sites estimate have a value of £150k per tree. Of course this is a local issue, not a national issue yet! But given continuing austerity and brexit uncertainty than what is happening in Sheffield 'may' be replicated in cities across Britain as cash strapped councils outsource the running of their cities to PFI multinationals.

And where Sheffield's trees are concerned, then during 2017 my focus will be on documenting what it means for Sheffield Streets to be stripped bare of the capital value of trees estimated to be worth £150k per large mature tree, as undoubtedly it will have detrimental effects on the value of all proeprties on the streets and cumulatively amounts to a devaluation of the whole city.

And if possible, I may venture into joining some of the campaigning groups despite their left wing nature and blind love of all things Labour, perhaps the expected tree carnage during 2017 will see reality dawn on campaigners to see that it is a LABOUR council that is doing this to Sheffield, in which respect they should be focusing on holding the Labour council to account at the next local elections in May 2018.

In the meantime do check out some of our more recent videos documenting what is happening to Sheffield's street trees, with many more to follow during 2017:

By Nadeem Walayat

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

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Nadeem Walayat has over 30 years experience of trading derivatives, portfolio management and analysing the financial markets, including one of few who both anticipated and Beat the 1987 Crash. Nadeem's forward looking analysis focuses on UK inflation, economy, interest rates and housing market. He is the author of five ebook's in the The Inflation Mega-Trend and Stocks Stealth Bull Market series that can be downloaded for Free.

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