Notes of the meeting held at the Marriot Hotel, Hale Barnes on Sunday, 30th November 2014 @ 20:00
Disclaimer: - These are not minutes and are my personal view on the events of the meeting.
Background: I only discovered about this development when there was an article in the local paper about it about a week ago. It was not well publicised but there is a website set up by the promoters…
http://haleeruv.org/
The meeting was supposed to be a ‘consultation’ but it wasn’t like any other consultation I have ever attended.
It was from the Hale Eruv website that I realised the extent of the development and I started a blog on the Trafford MBC website and also contacted Greater Manchester Humanists.
Whilst I was waiting to set off for the meeting I was surprised to see that it was the lead item on the local BBC News, including an interview with ex Councillor Neil Taylor.
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The meeting was held in an upstairs room at the Marriot Hotel in Hale Barnes, I drove into the car park at about 7:30pm and even then it was obvious that it would be a popular meeting. I arrived in the meeting room at about 7:45.
The room was set out with about 100 seats, at 7:45 it was 75% full and at about 7:55 a request for additional seats was made by the organisers. Some additional seats did appear but even then there were a lot of people standing. I estimate that there were about 200 people present in the room, many arriving as the meeting started due to difficulties parking at the hotel.
The presentation started almost on time at 8:00, it was being given by Abraham Wahnon of Josh Bosh Consultancies based in Borehamwood in Hertfordshire. Mr Wahnon is both an engineer and orthodox Jew who has successfully steered other Eruvs through the planning process.
Mr Wahnon from the outset was both aggressive and condescending, he immediately criticised the BBC story claiming that he had been waiting for them to interview him but they failed to appear. He then, in combative style, started to dispel myths about the Eruv; the problem was most of these myths were straw men that no one at the meeting believed. They were issues such as the construction of 3m high walls and other physical boundaries.
He in detail described the colour coding on the plans. Blue Lines indicate sections where there are no additional fences, posts or wire; Red Lines indicate sections where posts and wire will be erected; Yellow are sections where fences will be ‘repaired or reinstated’. He stated that no planning application had yet been submitted but that one will be submitted within the coming weeks (although when that means, despite requests for clarification, was not clear).
All this happened before he started to introduce his PowerPoint presentation!
He started the presentation with an outline agenda and described it as short. It soon became obvious that he was talking about other Eruvs he had successfully lobbied for and not the Hale Eruv, the audience was getting restless. People were already arguing with Mr Wahnon, he continued to treat the audience as school children, admonishing one (admittedly an aggressive heckler) with, “Shut up! Shut up!” Audience members shouted such comments as, “We’re not interested in history”, and it was becoming shambolic.
After about 5-minutes, someone at the back of the room suggested in no uncertain terms that he stop the presentation and go straight onto questions. This suggestion received the backing of the vast majority of the audience. The presentation was stopped and we went onto questions.
There was also a request for the Rabbi backing the application to show himself and come to the front. Rabbi Joel Neal Portnoy from the Shay Lane synagogue introduced himself and came to the front. Also at the front were a rabbi from the Prestwich Eruv, Rev. Clarke(??) and another Jew who did introduce himself as a ‘well-known in the local community and you may have seen me about’, I didn’t catch his name.
Questions then followed thick and fast, the meeting was chaotic and many questions were not answered or dealt with with a bland “I note your comments” or similar. I will give an overview of the questions and some of the answers in no particular order – some interesting facts did emerge.
Various Christians stated that the choice of the date was insensitive to them, the word ‘crass’ was used in this context, being the first day of Advent and on the ‘Lord’s rest day”. Others felt a Sunday night at 8:00 was not a convenient time and should have been moved. The local vicar (Rev. Clarke??) gave the counter argument saying that he was not offended.
Some people stated that this was not a consultation, sentiments that I have to agree with.
There was a lot of dissatisfaction with the lack of responses to questions on the Hale Eruv website, although most do now seem to have been answered.
In a response to details on the number of people affected (i.e. orthodox Jews) Rabbi Portnoy stated that it was in the ‘tens’, in other words less than 100 people. Neil Taylor (ex Lib Dem councillor) from the audience gave some figures from the 2011 Census that there are about 8500 properties in the area of the Eruv. He gave a figure of 350 for the number of Jews (although the Rabbi then gave a figure of 1000 ‘souls’ – whatever that means).
It transpired that only about 150 letters notifying the population of the Eruv had been sent out, which equates to less than 2% of the community affected. It appears that letters were only sent to the properties on the boundary which are next to the site of a proposed pole.
Other questions related to the need for a local Eruv. I asked, “Why can’t the whole of the UK be made into an Eruv?”, Neil Taylor asked, “Why not the whole of Trafford?”; someone else suggested it should be a ‘virtual’ boundary. The response to the last question from the rabbi was hilarious to us non-believers, it was along the lines of “Our scriptures don’t allow anything that is imaginary”
One secular Jew stated that it was within the power of the local Rabbi to grant exceptions to allow books to be carried, wheel chairs to be pushed, etc. I didn’t hear clearly the rabbi’s reply but he didn’t deny it and said what sounded like, “It will take much contemplation”. It was clear that even within the Jewish community there is far from a consensus backing this proposal.
NB If this is true, then surely this must be the preferred option!!
One NSS member stated that he would take a saw to the one proposed outside his property!!
A Muslim eloquently voiced how he cherished the mixed community he lived in and that this proposal will change that, “The Eruv would lead to segregation”. The opinion was voiced that in these uncertain times that Hale would become a terrorist target. Someone else stated that to say it did not affect non-Jews was a lie; it is a philosophical change for all the community. People do not want to be part of the Eruv.
Consultation had only occurred with other faith groups, no attempt had been made to contact non-believers. One Muslim criticised the consultation with Councillor Butt, “He doesn’t speak for all Muslims”
A planning consultant referred to Planning Policy Reg. 8 (I think that was what it was)
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This was supposed to be a consultation but it didn’t appear to be that it was more like a fait accompli with the promoters still talking about submitting the planning application in the coming weeks despite the overwhelming opposition.
They just did not ‘get it’, they did not appreciate the effect on the community, they played to the heart strings with ‘children in wheelchairs’ but didn’t grasp the animosity to the creation of a Jewish enclave in a secular area. They talked of being upset by the reaction but had no appreciation that the community was upset.
This is about segregation.