A fool returneth to his folly [Proverbs 26:11]

Yesterday evening (13th November) an Extraordinary Meeting of MVDC was held at which Cllr David Preedy moved:
"This Council calls on the Executive to withdraw the Council's appeal against the decision of the Judicial Review into the Cherkley Court planning application."
 
This was defeated by 19 votes to 14.
So MVDC remains committed to gambling public money on a double or quits venture.
 
During the debate there was an erroneous comparison made with the Council's support in the case of appeal over the proposed Tesco store in Ashtead! The cases are not the same. The Tesco one was an appeal made by the developer to the Planning Inspectorate; the Cherkley case is an appeal in the Court of Appeal against the ruling of a High Court judge. One is worried when some councillors, it seemed to me, did not appreciate this distinction.
 
Indeed, I have said more than once before that if councillors had been sensible on 4th April 2012 they would have accepted their own Officers' recommendation to reject Longshot's application and let Longshot appeal to the Planning Inspectorate.
 
So folly now follows folly. Much was made by some that the judge who allowed this to proceed to the Court of Appeal said that the appeal had a good chance of succeeding. Well, he would say that, wouldn't he? It needs to be balanced against the High Court Judge's opinion that any appeal must fail. For the appeal to succeed all three grounds on which Justice Haddon-Cave found against MVDC have to be overturned, not just one of them.
The appeal is a gamble.