Yngwie

1 hour ago, wilsywilsy said:

To be fair to the NIMBYs, building houses is a weak comparison to use - houses aren't packed to the rafters with explosive chemical compounds

Mains gas though? And don’t get me started on cars and lorries, mobile bombs laden with explosive fuel! And then we have chemical factories, oil refineries, nuclear power plants and so on, which all obtained planning permission. Risk is everywhere you look.

I wonder what break clauses there might be in his 3 year contract? Without the battery farm, I’m not sure how we will be able to pay his wages (which I’m assuming are fairly high) regardless of which league we are in, and we might also struggle to fund the pay-off if he doesn’t stay.

57 minutes ago, Jack Waddington said:

Clach have parted ways with their Chairman and board.

 

Oh how I envy them

You do realise that, whatever you think of his abilities, getting rid of our Chairman any time soon would equate to switching off our life support machine?!

Ta, that explains why I couldn’t find his name associated with it.

In the interests of balance, this company does events relating to numerous clubs, eg recently did something with Charlie Mulgrew, and their forthcoming evening with Paddy McCourt certainly isn't going to attract many Rangers fans.

30 minutes ago, STFU said:

And it's an event being run by our CEO.

Is he involved in ‘The Longest Forty Production Co’ that seems to have organised this event? A quick it of googling suggests it is run by a John Brown, who is not Bomber Brown, as far as I can see.

Butcher had also been at Rangers the other night. Somehow I don’t think his tour of former clubs will include an invite from Hibs.

Are you suggesting that SG has control over the decisions made by the police? Or that the police lift people because of the opinions they express regarding the competence of football club officials?

1-2 FT. That is a terrible result.
 

Our home form is abysmal and I seem to say it regularly but i feel so sorry for our home fans having to endure so much p1sh.

What?! 

Can this week get any worse?!

28 minutes ago, DoofersDad said:

But they didn't really go through the proper process if they didn't use the Council's pre-application consultation process.  This might have allowed them to fully address the issues of concern and have the application go through with a "better look" which would not have triggered the subsequent process.  The subsequent process might be very unusual, but I assume it is a legitimate one or else the Council officials would not have allowed it to be used.  No doubt the club will, quite rightly, take legal advice on this.

Whether it got through the planning committee vote or not is actually not really relevant in terms of judging how the club behaved.  Clearly the application had some issues associated with it and there was a significant risk it would not go through the committee and get planning permission. They put the application in knowing that it was on protected green space, so, of course there was a risk.  The club put the future of the club against that risk and that, to my mind, was reckless.  

It would still have been reckless had they won the vote yesterday.  If you staked your household's life savings on an even money favourite at Cheltenham, then win or lose, it would still be a very reckless thing to to.  If you are going to stake all your savings on something, then you need to be like Putin in today's election and get all the necessary arrangements in place to make sure you do win.  The club and its partners failed to do the necessary work to ensure the application's smooth progress and then reduced the chances of it going through subsequently by antagonising the very people they needed to persuade.

I should add that I am in no way defending the elected councillors here.  It does appear that there are some who have some kind of agenda.  Others on both sides of the argument could barely string two words together and were utterly incapable of making a coherent argument to support their voting intention.  The whole episode is just a shambles all round.

A few comments on your thoughts there.

1. They 100% did go through the proper process.

2. Pre-application consultation is optional. Had they done it it would have just delayed the application process, which in turn would have reduced the financial gain due to the terms of the deal the club struck with their partners. The sum has already dropped due to the delays.

3. The pre-application advice would simply have told them what everyone already knew, that the site is on green space and therefore the application could not be supported by the planning department. That’s something that is incapable of being changed.

4. I fail to see what could have been done that would have stopped Councillor Oldham being against the application and seeking to overturn the initial consent.

5. In terms of ‘recklessness’, filling out a few planning forms and paying a few fees in the hope of getting £3.4m is not reckless. It is valid to criticise years and years of spending in excess of our income which got into this financial black hole, but not to criticise a pretty low risk project that could get us out of it!

2 minutes ago, roarer said:

For goodness sake don't tell Dougal!

For goodness sake don’t tell Charles!

46 minutes ago, DoofersDad said:

Chairman Ross Morrison made the following statement to give fans an update on the week’s events.

“The club notes with bewilderment and disappointment, yesterday’s refusal of the ICT Battery Farm planning application.”

“Without going into everything that happened, it was an especially mystifying decision given that no new evidence was provided which was worthy of overturning the previous progressive and lawful vote in February to grant us planning. We can however confirm that we are appealing the decision to the Scottish Govt.”

“While this bizarre decision to overturn our previous successful planning application was a set-back to our robust and long term business plan, we will consolidate and pull together as a Board and a club as we have done many times in our history both on and on the field.”

“We want to thank the hundreds of Caley Thistle fans and the businesses and organisations who have been entirely supportive in our quest to improve the club’s financial model and the city’s energy security. “

“On behalf of the Board and as we move into our historic thirtieth year and a crucial end of season period, we need to show that by sticking together and sticking to our values, by backing Duncan and the team, nothing can stop us getting to where we want to be this season and in our next 30 years.”

#TogetherNess

 

I understand the frustration, but it is this type of confrontational language which stirred up the opponents of the scheme in the first place.  It should be noted that when the application was originally submitted, the Community Council within which the site sits, did not even bother to respond to the application despite being directly consulted by the Council.  That lack of response is probably a much better reflection of the level of concern of local residents than we were led to believe yesterday.  It is only when the club came out with all guns blazing that any meaningful opposition and safety concerns emerged.  

The applicants had satisfied the planners on the initial planning concerns and it was only the green space issue which was outstanding.  My view is that the response to this concern, that the planting of trees and shrubs would both increase the biodiversity and carbon capture of the site, would have won over sufficient councillors to get the application through.  It was the CC's very belated concerns regarding safety which probably tipped the vote the other way.

Then, of course, there is the point that the applicants chose not to use the Council's Pre-application Consultation Service.  Had they done so, they might have had a better understanding of what the potential obstacles were and therefore submitted an original application which addressed those concerns.  It might then have got approval without all the rancour and controversy.

Given that this whole episode is one massive own goal by the club, I would have hoped for a bit of humility and contrition in this statement.  Sadly, it is not to be and it is all getting a bit embarrassing.

 

Some of that criticism is somewhat unfair and overlooks the fact that the club went through the proper process got it through planning permission, they did it. Nobody could have predicted the highly irregular manoeuvre that happened next. 

He’ll fit right in then, get him signed!

1 minute ago, STFU said:

Since we're all posting images....

Not as funny as the others

I took a screenshot of the live stream.

You are right with that, and in some respects the club certainly hasn't helped itself there.

Something that has been said many times over the years though and which sprung to mind again yesterday, is that the city doesn’t deserve the team.

Surprised we have had no statement but on the other hand I suspect any statement issued on the day of the decision would have been written with fury. They have probably been in discussions about an appeal. Hopefully we get a measured response very soon.

9 hours ago, old caley girl said:

Will a list of who voted each way be published? 

Anyone know if this is publicly available yet?

Why would the council be pursuing their own BESS projects whilst at the same time citing safety concerns about them as a reason to refuse our one? Surely there isn’t one rule for them….

2 hours ago, old caley girl said:

 The standard of debate was awful. 

Not particularly surprising.

There was a debacle in Edinburgh recently where their Council decided to toss a coin to determine whether the applicant for a housing development should pay £1m or £3m to the Council.

It’s a dark day for us, annd  all the more galling because the application had been approved through the normal process.

We will likely appeal but that costs a lot of money (a KC was mentioned by the club, they cost thousands of pounds per day). And it takes time. And it’s probably 50/50 whether it succeeds.

The time issue means:

1. We need a source of funds to keep us going until the appeal is determined.

2. It will not be resolved before the extended deadline for the annual accounts and going concern statement therein.

3. The appeal will not be determined before the summer, so in terms of setting a wage budget for next season we will likely have to cut our cloth accordingly and assume the worst, which will mean some very difficult and unpleasant decisions having to be made - unless someone comes in to bankroll us, but the indications are that we’ve squeezed what we can from the current directors.

Dog walking and sledging are more important than net zero, it’s official!

41 minutes ago, lightlamp2 said:

it's just a patch of overgrown grass that people walk through.

Indeed. But local residents do like to walk their dogs there and so on and don’t want to lose that - given as a reason in the petition I saw. I wouldn’t want to lose it either if I walked there, but it is perhaps a bit ‘entitled’ to expect ongoing access to someone else’s private land.

If the club has a lease on the site, maybe we could sell a new type of ‘season ticket’ to residents who want to use our land!

The Highland region has no shortage of green space! It's an issue simply because that’s how it was designated by the council in the local plan and those who are against it can use that, arguing that this plan is the bible and must not be questioned. If, however, the plan had allocated 2% of this site to a net-zero project it would still have been approved at the time, without doubt.