Councillors on Norfolk County Council have voted to hold a debate on whether to continue with the construction of an energy from waste facility in the council.
Cory Wheelabrator has already reached financial close with the council for the facility and received planning permission from it in June 2012. The facility is currently the subject of a pubic inquiry that is due to report soon.
However, a motion proposed by Conservative Councillor John Dobson at a council meeting this week, called for a debate to be held within three weeks on whether to proceed with the facility.
He also called for the penalty clauses to be reviewed by the council’s cabinet scrutiny committee.
Councillors voted 81 to one in favour of staging the debate in front of the full council.
At the recent local elections, Norfolk County Council saw the Conservative Party lose power to no overall control following an increase in UKIP councillors.
Currently, the Conservative’s and Liberal Democrats are trying to put together a coalition to run the council, but this could be jeopardised by the Conservative’s largely being in favour of the facility, and Liberal Democrats largely against.
The motion proposed by Councillor John Dobson stated: “This new council wishes to make good, as a matter of urgency, the democratic deficit on the part of the former council in respect of the processes surrounding the decision to award a contract to Cory Wheelabrator for the procurement of a multi-burn incinerator at the Willows, King’s Lynn.
“To this end, the new council now calls for an extraordinary, full council meeting to be held within three weeks of the date of this motion, but after the date of the final submissions in the public inquiry ordered by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government into the award by the council’s planning committee of planning consent for the incinerator, solely to debate whether to proceed with procurement in its present form, or at all.”
The motion then asked council officials to produce short reports on the continuing need for the facility.
