Letters From A Desperate Campaign
By Glen Leat
August 8 2007
I read the various letters from the individuals who I imagine comprise the self-styled "Friends of the Rec" last Saturday but rather than immediately rise to the bait of inaccuracy, waffle and scare mongering I decided to reflect on the content for a few days before putting finger to keyboard. Here goes....
Let's work our way through the various offerings from AB Hooper, DG Drew, K McGarrigle, Worthy Gilson and B Ferol to see what they have to say. The total extent of the garbage written by this group means this dissection could cover many pages but I'll keep to the main points.
A B Hooper
I have known and worked with Mr Gilson for well over a decade and I do know he has done everything he can, within lawful limits, to protect the sensible interests of Bath Rugby even when some of our councillors and the top management of the club could not (in the words of the Charity Commission) "extrapolate" right from wrong themselves. due to blindness from private profit ambitions rather than the public environmental benefit intended as the purpose of the Rec charity.
It would be very interesting to have a chat with the management of Bath Rugby to ask for their view on how much Mr Gilson has done to protect the "sensible interests of Bath Rugby" in his words and actions over recent years, I'm sure we'd hear a very different story. The key word in this ridiculously pompous statement is "sensible". As with everything uttered by this minority group they wish to set the agenda for the rest of the citizens of BANEs regardless of how unpopular their views may be. Clearly Hooper believes that only Worthy Gilson knows what is right for Bath Rugby.
The simple truth is that the Rec is not for development by Bath Rugby or anyone else, and never will be thanks to a Charity Constitution that neither the council nor the charity commission will properly respect or manage, but must be stopped from further violation.
These so called Friends of the Rec are clearly keen that this patch of ground should lie dormant for the majority of the year rather than allow a profit making organisation to offer a service which benefits thousands. They also go on about the Rec being the (sacred) Village Green which, if they researched the true meaning of this term, would understand that this stands for the centre of a community. I'm 48 years old and I've never known the Rec being considered as the heart of Bath.
Gather around the Abbey area to celebrate 1000 years of monarchy in 1973, certainly, school festivals in the Guildhall, Assembly Rooms or Pump Room, definitely. The Rec as a venue? Never.
As a child born and bred in the City my mother would take my brother and I to the likes of Victoria, Alice, Alexandra, Henrietta Parks as well as Sydney and Parade Gardens to run off our excess energy. Never ever did we consider going to the Rec, after all it was a patch of scruffy ground with nothing to offer - except on match days of course (whether with Bath FC or Somerset cricket).
DG Drew
I'm convinced this individual has English as a second language because his letters rarely make sense. They remind me of Eric Morcambe playing the piano: "I'm playing all the right notes just in the wrong order".
This latest helping of diatribe will not enable us opponents to respond to such a request to cease.
Hmmmm, too many words or not enough in that sentence? You decide.
The "green lung" or "village green" is indeed crucial, and prompts us to hopefully bring to an end this bitterness and rugby's misinterpretation, to restore once more trust and fact.
David Bowie has always used the cut 'n paste method for writing his lyrics and it appears Drew has adopted this style. Why not print off this sentence, cut up the words and place them in an order of your choice?
Addressing us on numerical strength, while dependent on the BDOR strategic review figures and emphasising that the Rec is the club's home of rugby, indicates them to be the dominant member among amateur users, but despite all of this, it is unlikely that the commission would up-end their opponents so near to a new season.
It is possible that there are some four or five separate topics being discussed here, unfortunately he doesn't get to the end of one before beginning the next. He wasn't a script write on that unfathomable TV show 3:2:1 with Ted Rogers back in the 70's was he by any chance
K McGarrigle
"THERE are none so blind as those that will not see ."
Hooray one of them has got the message at last.
This is especially true of the fanatics that support Bath Rugby.
Oh, maybe not. So on the one hand we have less than a dozen supporters for Wretched Friends and more than 20,000 who signed a petition in support of keeping rugby at the Rec. Oh how blind are those 20,000?
What appears to have escaped so many supporters is the inappropriateness of a 15,000-seater stadium in the centre of a World Heritage City, on what is essentially our village green.
Oh oh, there's that term Village Green again. Yep, whenever I walk through the centre of the city I head straight for the Rec along with the thousands of others who see it as the natural meeting place. Let's face it, Bog Island is more of a Village Green than the Rec!
Worthy Gilson
EX-COUNCILLOR Agnes Melling is to be congratulated for her call for "honest answers" from our councillors over the desecration of the Rec and our inner city environment and hopefully many other issues as well.
To be fair to Mrs Melling, when in office she was among those who were fundamentally honest and practised what she preached - as does Cllr Andrew Furse (whose behind-the-scenes efforts have finally brought about the restoration of our historic Rec turnstiles - thank you Cllr Furse).
So, well done Mrs Melling - keep up the good work for as long as it takes because we will all benefit from a greater level of truth if it can be obtained.
So we are only to trust those councillors who have made it known that they support our cause are we? Perhaps Bob Calleja should just send a letter to the Chronicle with a list of Councillors who support his ambition as this would clearly demonstrate how isolated Gilson's supporters are in our political environment. I'm sure Gilson really believes in a form of democracy whereby the majority view usually prevails as opposed to a world whereby the tail wags the dog. He's just doing his best to hide this belief.
B Ferol
Or, after its vindictive and misguided assault on Mr Gilson (Comment, Saturday, July 28) who has fairly represented the best interests of our city's environment and its residents as well as showing every consideration for Bath Rugby (if only they had listened) for so many years, should this Johnny-come-lately editor now either apologise openly for such vindictive and unjustified verbal assault, or to put an end to this ill-informed and misguided campaign to further despoil our inner city open space by resigning altogether?
Johnny-come-lately, now doesn't that have a familiar ring to it? Who is it, Sam Holliday or Worthy Gilson? For goodness sake Mrs Ferol don't ever point a gun at your foot because it will go off!
Whatever happened to the previous editor David Gledhill and sensitive journalism without fear of being told to "stop complaints" - however justified they may be.
Ah the editor who I believe started the rot at the Chronicle by taking it down market, yes what happened to him? It went from a proper newspaper to a community rag which should have been re-cycled long before re-cycling became popular. Well done Sam for taking it weekly, best thing to happen to our local media in years.
The so called Friends of the Rec are not friends of the City of Bath or its citizens, they are a very small band of agitators who either have a personal interest in what happens at the Rec, are Bath City supporters jealous of the success of Bath Rugby or just enjoy the rent-a-mob notoriety they gain from getting their letters published in the Chronicle.
These recent letters indicate that they know they are losing the argument and, like the flailing arms of a drowning man, they are making a tremendous but futile attempt to get attention from passers by.