12th August 2013

PEEL SLAUGHTERS SILVER BIRCH TREES AS SALFORD PEOPLE POWER RESISTS

‘As the trees went down, our den went down and all our child­hood mem­o­ries were gone’ Olivia Cum­mings

Hor­ri­fied res­i­dents launched a spon­ta­neous demo last Fri­day as Peel Hold­ings trashed huge sil­ver birch trees on the field behind their homes in Booth­stown, with no warn­ing and no health and safe­ty mea­sures in place.

The police were called, and Sal­ford Coun­cil hur­ried­ly slapped preser­va­tion orders on the trees but by that time most were already felled… “Birch­field was named after these birch­es and they’ve just butchered them” says res­i­dent Michelle Baglin

“It’s noth­ing less than we’ve come to expect from Peel” Coun­cil­lor Gar­ri­do

“I was wear­ing my Sal­ford City Reds top and it has Peel on there as a spon­sor” recalls Olivia Cum­mings “I was walk­ing about with my hand over it as much as I could; I was so embar­rassed and so ashamed for wear­ing it…”

Olivi­er is just one of loads of local young peo­ple who have grown up play­ing around the huge sil­ver birch­es in the field at the back of hous­es on Birch­field Dri­ve in Booth­stown. For them, both the field and the dens built near the trees are mag­i­cal places that have spanned gen­er­a­tions. Then, last Fri­day, it all came crash­ing down as Peel Hold­ings sensed a quick buck to be made.

“We used to play in the dens behind the trees, and, as the trees went down, our den went down and all our child­hood mem­o­ries were gone” adds Olivi­er “We can’t go in there any more.”

Her friend, Oliv­er Ward, also wit­nessed Peel Hold­ings’ eco poli­cies at first hand…

“I was stood right in front of it and there were loads of sil­ver birch­es, some six­ty feet high, com­ing down, I was shocked” he says “Our child­hood just crashed. They did­n’t even put fences up, only when they knew we were going to tell. They lied to the police as well – it’s dis­gust­ing. I video‑d it on my broth­er’s phone.”

Peel Hold­ings might have got away with it com­plete­ly, but for the pesky kids and res­i­dents who organ­ised a spon­ta­neous protest on the field, com­plete with ban­ners.

“There was tree felling with no noti­fi­ca­tion to res­i­dents or notices on the entrances to pro­tect chil­dren, so we all head­ed on to the field and asked them to stop but they refused point blank” says res­i­dent Angela Hilton “We start­ed try­ing to block them, the police were called and then they did stop and promised not to fell any more trees. But ten min­utes lat­er, after the police had gone, they car­ried on. We filmed about half a dozen trees being felled and we went out again, then more police came…”

Dur­ing the events, local coun­cil­lor, Robin Gar­ri­do, was try­ing to get an emer­gency tree preser­va­tion order from Sal­ford Coun­cil but by the time it arrived, most of the dam­age had been done. Coun­cil­lor Gar­ri­do says he was ‘appalled’…

“On Fri­day I got a phone call from one of the res­i­dents say­ing they were up in arms that Peel Hold­ings had got con­trac­tors felling trees on the site” he says “I got in touch with the Coun­cil which checked out the sit­u­a­tion and advised that there were no preser­va­tion orders on the trees and that, because the site was­n’t in a con­ser­va­tion area, there was noth­ing they could do, which was quite right.

“I came down to the site, saw what was hap­pen­ing, spoke to the Coun­cil again and they agreed that we could get an emer­gency tree preser­va­tion order” he adds “That was at 4:45pm,and at about 5:45pm an offi­cer of the Coun­cil came down to the site with the preser­va­tion orders, which means that they can’t remove any more trees with­out plan­ning per­mis­sion.

“We’re a bit con­cerned because we did agree with the con­trac­tors and Peel pri­or to that being served that no fur­ther trees would be felled that day” he explains “Imme­di­ate­ly after I left and the res­i­dents went back to their hous­es they felled a fur­ther six trees which is absolute­ly dis­gust­ing. I think it’s appalling that a com­pa­ny should behave in that sort of way but to be hon­est it’s noth­ing less than we’ve come to expect from Peel.”

Res­i­dents believe that the motive for the tree slaugh­ter is the prepa­ra­tion of the green site for build­ing hous­es. In 2004 there was a plan­ning appli­ca­tion sub­mit­ted for hous­ing which was reject­ed on the grounds of wildlife habi­tat destruc­tion amongst oth­er things. Now the wildlife is being dri­ven out.

Res­i­dents told the Sal­ford Star that, in 2004, Peel Hold­ings owned half the field, while Sal­ford Coun­cil owned the oth­er half – yet when the Coun­cil was check­ing into the tree preser­va­tion order last week, appar­ent­ly the site is whol­ly owned now by Peel.

“We want to know when the Coun­cil sold it” says Angela “If they sold it after 2004 when they knew Peel want­ed to build on it then, obvi­ous­ly, that’s naughty. There are a lot of hous­es around here and the only places chil­dren can go to play is either over the East Lancs Road, which is a haz­ard, or the main road which is a dan­ger. There’s always kids on here. This is the only green space they have.”

Last night, around forty local res­i­dents attend­ed a meet­ing at Booth­stown Library and vowed to car­ry on the fight against Peel.

“We don’t trust Peel Hold­ings, and we’ve got some­one on look­out so they don’t cut any more trees down when they’re ‘tidy­ing up’ ” says res­i­dent Michelle Baglin “We’re all work­ing class on here, and we look for­ward to tak­ing the kids on the field. They do have a good life but Peel don’t care. If we came down to their hous­es and ripped the trees out of their gar­dens I’m sure they would be kick­ing off like we are.

“Birch­field was named after these birch­es and they’ve just butchered them” she adds “Well, the pub­lic is not going to stay qui­et any longer. The mums are going to speak up and car­ry on fight­ing for our chil­dren.”