Bosses of Barony Park sports complex has been closed in Nantwich amid the latest unauthorised traveller encampment.
Everybody said the decision has been made today for staff and customer “safety” reasons.
after a group of travellers in around 16 caravans arrived on the park last night (Sunday June 9).
It’s the fifth incursion on the park by travellers this year.
Previous encampments have sparked complaints from residents.
A spokesperson for Everybody said today: “The Barony Sports Complex in Nantwich is closed until further notice due to travellers located on the site.
“This is to ensure both staff and customers are able to work and use the facilities in a safe and practical environment.
“We are working with neighbouring locations including Nantwich Swimming Pool and Shavington Leisure Centre to relocate regular bookings and in the meantime gym members can use any of our Everybody facilities as part of their membership.
“We will be updating with the re-opening of the Barony via our website everybody.org.uk and on our social media pages.”
A spokesperson for Cheshire East Council said: “The council is fully aware of the impact of unauthorised Gypsy and Traveller encampments on local communities and this latest encampment has, unfortunately, necessitated the closure of some sports and leisure facilities at Barony Park.
“The large number of Traveller families that have arrived at Barony Park has meant that customers of the Everybody leisure facilities have had to be directed to other centres and we thank residents and service users for their patience and understanding while legal processes are followed.
“It is the council’s intention that health and welfare and legal processes are followed as quickly as possible.
“Cheshire East Council continues to explore the options for a permanent Gypsy and Traveller transit site.
“We are in the process of undertaking a feasibility study at Cledford Hall and will establish the cost of development.
“While this work is carried out, we are considering other mechanisms to deal with the increase in unauthorised encampments.
“As previously stated, the council is also progressing discussions around acceptable methods and costs for protecting Barony Park from future unauthorised encampments.”
Strider, YOU buy some land (preferably where no-one will see you). No need to rely on others to provide for you. Did you but your van? So buy, or rent, some land. You need to understand that nothing in life comes free of charge. If you legally own your chosen piece of the UK, you can contribute to normal societal expectations and, in return, benefit from its facilities. But, YOU buy the land.
There, I’ve said it at least twice. Has it sunk in yet?
Next time you park on the Barony, I’ll cycle through your unauthorised camp, and perhaps you can explain to me why you haven’t yet purchased your land.
Kev,
Where have you got the idea that i said or implied anyone but the travellers will pay for the land? Please read my comments more carefully in the future.
Then you went on to say “preferably where no-one will see you” (very civil of you), to that i say Britain is not a wilderness, anywhere i could buy land (with planning permission, good luck to me on that one) somebody will see me, i am not invisible.
“No need to rely on others to provide for you” you said, really? What about the allocated land the councils should provide with planning permission for a traveller site, which the travellers should pay for.
Do you know of Dale Farm ( a former scrap yard dubbed “greenbelt”), evicted 2011?
Or Woodside Park, Hatch, Bedfordshire, evicted 2002?
or Bulkington Fields, evicted 2004?
Or the site at Meriden, evicted 2013?
All these sites were not given planning permission (why not begs the question, if land can be suitable for houses, why not for traveller sites?). At these sites the travellers PAID for the land.
The best thing for you to do Kev is to write to your local MP asking for the council to ALLOCATE, not pay, for land to be offered to travellers to develop a legal traveller site, who can then PAY for the land.
Have you understood me so far?
Rob, Strider, when might we next see you on the Barony? Just trying to give our authorities a heads-up…not that they’ll act on an open goal.
Clean, really, I must be blind as well as gullible.
Everything I’ve said is accurate, and can be substantiated. That said, with rights come social responsibility, and you demonstrate none. Enough said!
A right to a bin would be nice too.
And I’ll wipe your backside for you, in the process.
Do you wipe the backside of everybody who has a bin?
If Strider is so concerned about the “travellers”, go clean up the mess they leave behind and not leave it to honest working peoples taxes to pay for it..
Another “ Do Gooder” with no reality of life…
I think Strider has moved on with the vans!!!
Duncan, The reality is there would be no mess to clear up in the first place if there was a legal traveller site available for the travellers to move to, or am i being a “do gooder”?
No your missing the point, every point. You have no sensible answers. You avoid every point made, but harp on about your demands for a site, which you claim to be your right as a freeloading traveller. You’re a traveller, but don’t want to travel, so you’re really demanding a handout.
Rob / Strider, sign up to social responsibility. Or, next time you ‘visit’ the park I’ll likely deliver my garbage, and more besides, to you!
My answers are solutions, the travellers are landless, they need land, enough land to park a caravan on. The travellers leave a mess because of a lack of bins( you would call it anti social, lazy etc), they need bins, just like you.
You say i “harp on” about demands for a site, that is your opinion, but i believe the travellers need somewhere legal to live in their caravans, perhaps you think it is okay to camp illegally, (but i thought you were against this), to this you say i am a “freeloading traveller”, travellers would pay rent on such sites like other travellers do already on existing legal sites, just like people from your own community pays rent for flats, houses etc, does that make your own community freeloading? I have never once asked for a handout, just a legal site to move to, and pay rent on.
True to form, they’ve gone, leaving their mess for someone else to collect, FoC.
Rob, Strider would you care for the photographic evidence? Could you not at least take your rubbish with you?
Marvellous!
Kev, tell me, do you have garbage collection?
If there was a legal traveller site, there would be garbage collection.
Not the travellers fault there are none.
Yes, and I pay for it, like I paid for my property ie that place I call home, with association costs.
Why is it everyone else’s responsibility to sort your issues? Your position is fundamentally flawed at every level.
And you cant take it with you perhaps to the council waste site, eve though we fund that too?
That requires a permit, with an address.
The council needs to put bollards around the Barony Park which will prevent cars driving onto the park and therefore maintain it as a safe place for local people / tax payers to walk exercise and enjoy an open space as is the purpose of open spaces in our towns and cities. People do not feel safe with cars freely driving around the park. It is the councils duty to maintain the safety of all residents… Bollard the Barony!!!.. send me your email address here and I’ll start the campaign.. Bollard The Barony!!
How will that sort anything, the travellers would park on the main road, a transit site is needed, all this passing the buck solves nothing.
Falling foul of the highways regs, bringing you into contact with our bold, brave boys in blue!
Passing the buck. You mean responsibility? You want no responsibility but all the trappings of a decent sociable existence but at no cost. Joke…if it was funny.
“All the trappings of a decent sociable existence” , no legal traveller sites available, which traveller’s would pay rent like they do already on legal traveller sites in existence, but all full.
Hey Rob, why stop there; let’s invite the Caravan Club to park up, cancel all other scheduled events and, in the process, deny access to the general public. We could lay on party organisers, to go with the play facilities, and perhaps throw in hot tubs and burger vans.
Kev, The caravan club is for holiday makers, who return to their homes when the holiday is over.
The landless travellers live in their caravans all year round.
Nice try trying to compare though.
Then buy some land, or do you want it bought and financed for you, like everything else?
Buy land? Like what happened at Dale Farm, a former scrapyard dubbed “greenbelt”.
You’ve got to open and fair about this,if they had came in like some previous travellers and made a mess,then people quite rightly so wouldn’t be happy, but in this case it is absolutely immaculate.and still there are people complaining,so that shows when previous people complained about the mess,it was in fact an excuse.it was in fact just rascism, because people are complaining now and there is NO mess whatsoever.these people are British citizens, subjects of her majesty the Queen.they are not some illigal immigrants who crept into the country, could you just imagine the uprour if what was said about the travellers was said about other sectors of society ?but we couldn’t do that it would be politically incorrect !
Really, I must be blind as well as gullible.
Always the do gooders with the usual human rights rhetoric! These ‘travellers’ do not respect the local community’s human rights when they invade their land, be in personal land or public/council owned land? We’ve walked past there everytime another group have decided to ‘park up’ for a couple of weeks before they are moved on, and that’s after they’ve tipped off their fellow travellers who generally arrive a couple of weeks later? You try walking past, on the public pavement, or across the Barony field, and even dare to look in the direction of their very fancy and expensive looking, tax free caravans, and see what response you get? It is isn’t pleasant, and certainly doesn’t respect the human rights of the general public walking along the public highway? Do, human rights promoter, you may want to let them camp outside your house and see how you like it!
Travellers have human rights and we need to stop treating them like scum and start to provide a suitable place for them to stay.
I have a suitable place to stay – I had to buy it though.
Bob Bobson, Not everybody buys their property, a lot rent, same with travellers paying rent, if there was a legal traveller site.
They choose to be travellers… they choose to turn everywhere they stay into a rubbish dump.. they choose to behave in an anti social fashion… they choose to avoid taxation and all other social payments paid by the rest of hard working society…
there are billions of people on this planet ahead of them on my list of social victims… no sympathy here!
They do not choose to be landless, a legal traveller site is needed. By the way, travellers on legal sites do pay taxes, i do not know where you get your information from.
There is very little the council can do, there needs to be a change to the law before this ends.
Good luck with that any time soon, too busy trying to sort out the Brexit chaos
I went past their today,I have never seen a cleaner area !,not so much a a speck of dirt.its a pity some of the locals in the nearby housing estate wasn’t as clean, some people might not like this comment but I’m not going to tell a lie just to please people.it is immaculate.
Whilst I doubt that very much, it’s not the point. The tax paying public should not be barred from using the facilities by free loaders…again.
Kev, take a look for yourself. This is also precisely the reason a legal traveller site is needed. By the way, how do you assume the people using the facilities are all taxpayers, do you know their personal circumstances?
There is an old saying, don’t tar everyone with the same brush.while I would be the first to admit there has been travellers who have previously made a mess,what mess has been made here ?there is not so much as a matchstick on there.what harm are they actually doing ?I’ve actually spoken to some of the travellers and they were polite,curtious, friendly,what’s the problem.if I treated every house dweller in the same manner,no Matter how they actually acted it would be unfair.
More legal traveller sites = less illegal encampments.
And will they pay, to include Council Tax?
Kev, yes.
*fewer
Is it any wonder more have arrived after the last lot filmed the barony and “the playground and shower block that we are allowed to use”?
It was like watching a holiday advert
this is absolutely terrible – when are the council going to do something?
Perhaps we should not pay our council tax for the same amount of days that the travellers are here
What’s terrible ? I hope you can enlighten me ? They have kept it clean,on speaking to some of the travellers they were very polite and friendly.