Extraordinary goings on at Bassetlaw Council as elected councillors try to unpick bad decisions. I refer to the barmy decision to agree 47 traveller caravan emplacements. At the heart of this nonsense, just like the graveyard staking scandal, is the use of outside consultants and contractors.

Council staff from my experience are good at their job and know the patch. However they get lumbered with the mess of the outside contractor who wrongly staked the headstones. No council worker would ever have done that - many will have family in our cemeteries.

Then we have consultants from London writing the gypsy and traveller needs assessment. It is on the Council website under ‘planning’. It has obviously been well read before it was signed off in a delegated decision, because in the middle it starts talking about NHS staff in Essex!!

I think it far better to employ more planning officers and have locals writing these plans. Indeed I would cancel the plans to get rid of 29 council staff and employ more planning officers and others in key services. Imagine what two extra officers could achieve dealing with the flooding issues. Just one man covers this and he does so extremely well, but it is simply impossible to cover such a wide area on your own.

The Council objects to me criticising the pre-consultation with showmen wanting a site at Oldcotes. What I object to is that there was no parallel pre-consultation with local people, from neighbours to the Parish Council. This failure is totally against government planning guidance.

But then I also object to the fact that councillors making the planning decisions can meet the developers in advance in private.

Bassetlaw Council has attempted to silence me on this issue, but I am not going to be silenced. I want answers and you need answers. Rather than hide behind officers, lets have the councillors debating their policy in public with me. I therefore have offered to speak at the full Council on this matter. Do they have the bottle to let me?

Finally one improvement surely we can all agree on is that local elections should be held every four years, not annually. We are the only council to have annual elections in Nottinghamshire and Bassetlaw loses two months a year in electioneering rather than focusing on council business. With current turnouts,  it's time to change the system.

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You can read John Mann's objections to Oldcoates Travellers' site here.