PENTNEY - THE POOR SECOND COUSINS?
On Monday 28th April, a so called Joint Groups Assembly meeting was held at Leziate sailing club, to which only five Pentney residents attended - three of which were members of the Save Pentney Action Group. A disappointing turnout to a somewhat disappointing meeting.
Pentney was invited to attend this meeting on the understanding that it was established to represent all of the local areas affected by the quarry proposals, and that everyones concerns and fears would be considered.
This did not appear to be the case.

Our own Save Pentney Action Group was represented at the meeting by Cliff Smalley who stood up and gave a rousing speech, outlining our strategy towards fighting the MIN93 quarry proposal. Cliff went on to praise Norfolk County Council for producing the much talked about Blue Book, without which no-one would have known about the proposals, and he encouraged everyone to either obtain a copy, or download it from the NCC website.
Cliff pointed out that we're in something of a David and Goliath situation. We're heavily outgunned in a fight which we didn't ask for, but that won't stop us from taking up the fight.
A stirring round of applause was heard when Cliff referred to the oppressive nature of those behind the proposal threatening our village, and said "This is the 21st century - We don't do knuckling of forelocks anymore in Pentney - Don't you do it either".
Finally, Cliff was forced to cut his speech short in its prime as the chairman rudely flashed a "hurry up" sign at him despite allowing other speakers to talk for much longer. So Cliff finished his speech off to another round of applause when he compared our current situation to the opening skirmishes of what's likely to be a very long war, and urged everyone in the room to heed the words of Winston Churchill when he said "KBO...Keep Buggering On".

Also present at the meeting were representatives from ERASE, Neil Paddock from EWAG, Ian Monson from Norfolk County Council, borough councillor Alistair Beales, and county councillor Heather Bolt. Finally, taking on a double workload by standing in for Nick Daubney, leader of Kings Lynn and West Norfolk borough council who unfortunately coundn't make it to the meeting due to hectic schedule, as well as representing himself was councillor Brian Long, deputy leader of the borough council.
Notably, following a requested show of hands by EWAG's Neil Paddock, there were no representatives present from Middleton Aggregates or WBB Minerals

As the evening proceeded, it became clear from listening to the dignitaries and representatives, that while they supported the action groups and campaigns, they were rather blinkered in that they could not see beyond the quarries around East Winch and Ashwicken.
This became glaringly obvious when a question was asked about the fate of the Pentney green burial site which falls within the MIN93 proposal.
Borough councillor Alistair Beales elected to answer this question, and proceeded to inform the room that areas of special scientific interest within MIN40 would not be dug up.
It was pointed out to him that the question was in fact about a green burial site within MIN93, not an area of special scientific interest within MIN40, but again, he replied with the same answer.
Eventually, the microphone was taken by Heather Bolt who promised to research the question and report back with an answer.

The evening concluded with a general request for all the regional groups to put forward representatives to form a joint action group to represent the region. This caused more concern for Pentney, as the proposed group is to be called RASSE (Region Against Silica Sand Extraction).
Notice that there is no provision in there to represent villages like Pentney who are fighting a gravel quarry proposal.
This point was raised, and I voiced concerns that if Pentney were to become involved in such a group, we might find ourselves devoting all our time, resources and funding to a fight which was focused entirely on someone elses village.
I hoped that our concerns on this matter would be laid to rest and we would be assured that the group would reflect ALL our interests, the name would be changed to reflect wider range of issues affecting the region, not just those of silica sand extraction, and that we would not be swept under the carpet as appeared to be happening at the meeting.

Quite the opposite happened in fact.
I was shouted down and told that the meeting was nothing to do with gravel. I was informed that this was an ERASE meeting, and therefore it was exclusively about silica sand issues, and that I should effectively just "shut up and mind my own business".

This was NOT an ERASE meeting.
This was a meeting organised by ERASE to draw together all the individual action groups in one common united cause.

If the plight of Pentney village is being dismissed as secondary to that of East Winch and Ashwicken at such an early stage, can we honestly say that things will improve?

It is important that we stand in solidarity alongside our neighbouring villages.
It is important that we put up a unified front to fight the common enemy.
But co-operation is a two way street.
Our neighbours cannot expect us to keep giving, but then shout us down when we need something in return. Something as simple as recognition or representation.

Pentney needs to think long and hard, and some serious reassurances will have to be given before we take the risk of devoting our time and resources to RASSE.