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Saturday, November 26, 2005

Wyre valley give themselves permission to fly EU rag again

Wyre Valley District Council have given themselves permission to fly the EU rag again.

A few weeks ago, Neil Herron and his colleagues discovered that they were flying the flag without planning permission and forced them to remove it.

Since then, they have been flying the English flag in its place.

However, WVDC are determined to show their alliegence to the EU (presumably to achieve their aim 'to become the best District Council in England') and at a meeting of the planning committee last night, voted to approve their own planning application to fly the EU rag despite it being illegal and having received 19 objections from the public.

There are two reasons why this is wrong.

Firstly, WVDC is in England and should fly the English flag, not the EU rag. The Queen commands when flags should be flown and these instructions are sent to local authorities by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. These instructions are a royal command, not suggestions. The Queen commands that the EU rag be flown only on Europe Day, not every day of the year.

Secondly, Section 19 of the Local Authority Guidelines on publicity says that a local authority is not permitted to spend public money to try to convince the public to hold a particular view. Flying the EU rag is an advertisment under the Town and Country Planning Act and the purpose of an advertisment is to promote a product, service, opinion, etc. By flying the EU rag, WVDC is promoting the EU. The EU is a political project and the local authority is therefore breaking the law by promoting it witht he intention of convincing the public of its merits.

The EU rag will come down, it is simply a question of when.

See Also:
Neil Herron (and again)