A major new section has been added to the letter of support - 3.2 We commend Keep Ulverston Special for having conducted a very effective campaign that has held the public imagination that they command widespread support. Unfortunately the evidence shows this has been mostly smoke and mirrors. Their original campaign centred on persuading people to send in letters of complaint to SLDCs planning office. We did a random survey of 100 of these submissions of the neighbour responses on the planning website and found: 3.2.1 Despite KUSs claim that 1600 complaints had been sent in, there were actually an estimated 350 neighbour responses actually on the website. 3.2.2 Our survey was hampered by two factors: 3.2.2.1 A very large number of the documents had been duplicated or more and would need to disregarded. 3.2.2.2 A significant number of individuals had sent in two or more separate submissions. 3.2.2.3 Some of the responses were requests for further information, without expressing an opinion whether they supported the supermarket, or were against it. 3.2.3 No campaign had been set up for letters of support to be sent in, despite that we found 6 while looking for the sample of 100 complainants; one of these was a rather passionate one representing a shopkeeper. 3.2.4 Despite having concentrating their efforts to attract support from people in Ulverston with a leaflet drop, only a half (50/100) of respondents had addresses within the town. 3.2.5 23/100 respondents were from local village communities, with Swarthmoor (6/100) being over-represented for its size. Comments on some submissions show that some of those who complained against the brewery site did so because they preferred the supermarket proposal from Sainsbury’s near Swarthmoor. 3.2.6 20/100 respondents were from larger towns and villages in South Cumbria, which have their own supermarkets in their community, or Ulverston is not the local shopping destination; we found 7 from Barrow alone. 3.2.7 The remaining 7 respondents were completely out of the area; including 3 from the south of England. None of these showed any permanent connection with Ulverston. 3.2.8 Taking all things into consideration we estimate that there are unlikely to have been more than 200 individuals who registered opposition to the supermarket with the council, therefore our sample is statistically sound. 3.2.9 Of the complaining neighbour responses in our sample from Ulverston, 39 (78%) were concentrated in a very small area roughly north of the Gill, Market Street and the A590, out from Tank Square. Half of these (19) were from addresses from the residential roads to the north of the town centre, away from the development. It is notable that, apart from residents in Hart Street, very close to and Burlington Street, which is adjacent to the site, no further responses were found from the streets off Hart Street or Swan Street. Our sample only included a response from one business. 3.2.10 3 (6%) responses came from the more affluent Springfield Road area, and a staggeringly mere 8 (16%) from the estates south of the A590 where most people live. 3.2.11 Leaving the immediate site and town centre aside, where people can be right to be concerned: The areas to the north of the town and Springfield Road tend to house the more affluent in our community, who can best afford the high food costs within our town, and this is where the limited support against the supermarket has come from. 3.2.12 We may conclude from the evidence that KUS have attracted little support outside the areas nearest the development and not elsewhere within the town. Whether they have attracted more than a significant minority support in their core area, let alone a majority, is open to question. The belief amongst most of the townsfolk is that the core members of the anti-supermarket campaign have got a few friends and neighbours to support them and generally annoyed everyone else. This is borne out to a large extent by them concentrating their efforts in the town, but getting half their responses from areas away from it.
Posted on: Mon, 21 Jul 2014 10:27:09 +0000
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