Ripon Civic Society has called on the local authority to provide a consultee comment on the safeguarding aspects of Ripon Cathedral’s controversial annexe plans.
Calls for safeguarding review of cathedral plans
Ripon Civic Society, which has an advisory role on local planning, urged in their most recent objection that:
“We do not believe that the proposed annexe, as designed, provides the necessary level of safe keeping, security and segregation to satisfy the above requirements. The proposal is for a large building accommodating a variety of functions, one of which is a song school. However, it also includes uses with uncontrolled public access, including public toilets, a refectory and a shop sharing single access with the song school.
“We do not consider that it is acceptable from a safeguarding perspective to have a facility for a large number of children and young people within a mixed use, publicly accessible building without a separated access. For this reason alone, the design and location of the annexe requires a rethink.”
The society continued by requesting that the corporate director of children and young people’s Services, Sir Stuart Carlton, who was recently knighted in the King’s Honours List, be consulted:
“Since safety is one of the main justifications for the application, we request that the Local Authority’s Children and Young People’s Service is consulted on the application and we have copied this letter and the supporting document to Stuart Carlton, Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services.”
Are safeguarding requirements met?
This public request could prove awkward for North Yorkshire Council, which is the overall body which will make the planning decision on the cathedral annexe plans. If it does give a consultee comment which finds safeguarding flaws with the annexe, then this will effectively torpedo the cathedral’s repeated claims that this annexe is needed for safeguarding reasons. It may also call into question, who on the cathedral and Chapter side, made the decision to run with this safeguarding argument.
On the other hand, if Sir Carlton disagrees with Ripon Civic Society and accepts that the annexe meets safeguarding requirements, then this would call into question why other organisations, like schools, are required to take such care to separate the public from children.
Mitigation of safeguarding concerns
In a previous objection which was reported on by the BBC in late December, Ripon Civic Society also highlighted the mixing of the public and choristers as a concern.
“The choristers will use the staircase and entrance hall that is also to be used by members of the public; this is not good safeguarding practice. It could be overcome by providing separate access and stairs to the Song School and Robe Store. We also note that there are only two WCs for the choristers. On days when all the choristers (up to 60, we are told) and the adult members of the choir and music staff are together, this is inadequate. Nor would it be good safeguarding practice to allow children to use the public toilets.”
Local resident Pat Waterfall, who is a campaigner against the location of the annexe, noted the lack of a detailed explanation of the current safeguarding concerns and how these would be mitigated against in the current planning documents. With over 1,000 documents now uploaded to the planning portal, it is arguably a significant oversight that there is not one document dedicated to explicitly outlining how safeguarding could be mitigated with the new annexe.
Waterfall commented:
“Given there are 60 plus children, are the parents called on for chaperoning duties and if so, are they all DBS checked? The Dean and Chapter claim that nowhere in the cathedral is big enough to take the whole choir. Will they really all fit in the annexe song school? Two toilets don’t seem adequate for 80+ people and the accessible toilet isn’t within the choir school area.
“Surely proper safeguarding would make it essential to have the song school completely separated from any public areas, ie with its own dedicated entrance.”
National and regional objections contrast minimal local support
At present, a significant number of national and regional organisations have submitted objections to the revised annexe plans. Organisations such as The Woodland Trust, CPRE: The Countryside Charity, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, Yorkshire Gardens Trust, Ripon Civic Society and Ripon City Council have all publicly passed on their objections to North Yorkshire Council.
The petition to ‘Save the Trees’ has around over 2.5k signatures on it from people objecting, while despite 12 January being the two year ‘anniversary’ of the application being validated, only 262 people had by then publicly supported the annexe plans via the planning portal. With a Ripon population of approximately 17,000, this level of support is very low indeed.
No response over safeguarding concerns
The term ‘safeguarding’ has been used repeatedly by the developer to advocate that a new annexe is necessary. To ensure that the community of Ripon could be properly reassured about the civic society’s safeguarding concerns, Yorkshire Bylines contacted the cathedral to ask for their response to the claims and the society’s call for a safeguarding review, to offer them an opportunity to give a response.
There has so far been no response.
More from Brian McHugh:
- 2024 confirmed as hottest year on record globally
- UK inland bathing sites polluted with ‘perfect storm’ of chemical cocktails
- Review of ‘The Serviceberry – An Economy of Gifts and Abundance’ by Robin Wall Kimmerer
CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO OUR CROWDFUNDER
HELP US BECOME STRONGER SO THAT WE CAN CONTINUE TO DELIVER POWERFUL CITIZEN JOURNALISM!
