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Challenging plan: Tony Hickson shows off his proposal outside parliament |
‘Forget parliament, give us pedalos and a duck pond’
PARLIAMENT is sinking under the flotsam of supermarket receipts, MPs are drowning in taxpayers’ bile and speaker Michael Martin has long since walked the plank.
The expenses scandal has had journalists reaching for water metaphors like they were hammering their typewriters from the top deck of the Titanic.
Now one disillusioned voter is trying to turn figures of speech into literal intentions with an audacious bid to flood the House of Commons.
Tony Hickson, 40, has submitted a planning application to Westminster City Council to turn London’s most famous building into an underwater nature reserve. His one-line proposal says: “I want to knock down the building and build a nature reserve with the capacity for migratory birds.” An accompanying map shows a “badger bridge” in the place of Westminster Bridge, a duck pond where the debating chamber is and a duck hotel and pedalo park on the site of New Palace Yard.
Westminster City Council doesn’t see the funny side, calling the application a “frivolous publicity stunt”.
Under the borough’s planning policy the usual fee to submit an application is waived because it is classified as a conservation project. Mr Hickson hopes his application will be heard by the planning committee because, as he claims, the Houses of Parliament are “owned by the public”.
“I was doing a bit of digging around on the council’s website and I found this loophole. Normally you would have to pay £350 but because I want to turn it into a nature reserve I don’t have to pay a penny,” he said. “Technically I don’t own the Houses of Parliament so I had to fudge that bit of the form. But I think there’s a case for it being owned by taxpayers. I know it’s a listed building, but I understand they relax planning laws for conservation projects.
“The expenses scandal showed that parliament isn’t fit for purpose. I think it would be great. MP’s could move out because they don’t spend much time there as it is. They could go to the Trocadero or something. We could put an ice cream van in the middle, have pedalos and a duck pond. I think the tourists would love it.”
A spokeswoman for the council said: “We really would prefer it if people didn’t submit frivolous applications to get publicity for themselves.”
Mr Hickson, from Crouch End, is studying for a law degree and is planning to obey the requisite notification details by plastering his proposals around Parliament Square. |
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