Call for united cleaning effort

Concerns have been raised that different councils are not communicating with each other over street cleansing work.

Nottinghamshire County Council, has announced that it will clean gullies — gaps at the side of the road that allow water drainage — twice a year instead of once.

But there are worries that the work has not been co-ordinated with street sweeping, the responsibility of Newark and Sherwood District Council.

A member of Southwell Town Council, Mr Peter Harris, said the district council’s street sweepers should clean roads before the county council’s gully cleaners, or their work could be undone.

He said sweeping put all the dirt back into the recently cleared gullies.

“Surely they should get their heads together and organise themselves,” Mr Harris said.

Mr Harris said notice should also be given of when street cleansing work was carried out.

He said gullies were cleaned recently on Hillside Drive but because there was no warning, people had left their cars on the road.

He said around 25% of the gullies had not been cleared as a result.

Blocked gullies were blamed for some of the flooding in Southwell last year.

A map of all the gullies in Southwell, which regularly become blocked, has been created with the help of residents.

The chairman of the town council’s planning committee, Mr Brendan Haigh, intended to hand the map to the county council cabinet member for the environment, Mrs Stella Smedley.

However, at short notice he was told Mrs Smedley had another engagement and had to cancel.

He said he refused to see a county council officer instead because he wanted to hand the map personally to Mrs Smedley.

“The whole point of going to see her was to impress upon her how strongly people in the town felt about the matter,” he said.

Another meeting has not yet been arranged.