Airdrie-Bathgate Railway and Linked Improvements Bill Committee, 25 Sep 2006

Meeting date: Monday, September 25, 2006

Official Report 385KB pdf

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Late Objections (Consideration)

Agenda item 2 is consideration of two late objections. The committee is required to consider the objections and decide whether each objector has shown good reason for not lodging their objection within the specified objection period, which ended on 31 July. If the committee agrees that the objector's reason is acceptable, the objection will be allowed to proceed.

I invite comments from committee members on the objections, which are annexed to paper AB/S2/06/5/2. The first objection, which is found in annex A, is from Professor Stewart.

There seem to be special circumstances.

Agreed.

Agreed.

We will accept the objection.

The second objection is on behalf of Ferntower Estates Ltd, which suggests that there have been difficulties with communications. Perhaps we should take that on board.

I am not totally convinced, but I suppose we should err on the side of caution and allow the objection. It is not a strong argument for Ferntower Estates to say that it advised Jacobs Babtie at a meeting that communications should be sent to another address. I suspect that, had the boot been on the other foot and the promoter mentioned something at a meeting but did not confirm it in writing, that would have been a problem for the promoter.

With those reservations, we will allow both objections to stand.