Bedford council admits mistake after destroying shrubs in Prime Ministers' community planters
The council has apologised for the way staff cut back various community planters dotted around the Prime Ministers area of Bedford.
Last week, community gardeners in the area – which is also known as Black Tom – were left incandescent with rage when plants were cut back in a scene akin to a horticultural horror movie.
Many residents in Stanley Street, Beaconsfield Street and Palmerston Street had spent their own time and money cultivating flowers, shrubs and bushes in the council's planters.
And now – in a shock admission – the council has put its hands up to making a mistake.
Pressure and behaviour transformation specialist Naomi Whiteley – professionally known as The Pressure Assassin – asked why the council had failed to established which planters maintained by residents and which ones weren’t.
She said: “Pressure narrows thinking. When people are rushing, focused entirely upon completing a task or concerned that questioning an instruction will make them appear difficult or incompetent, they stop looking at the wider consequences.
“One poor instruction then travels through an entire chain until the damage has been done and everybody starts asking who was responsible.”
The Pressure Assassin added that although the damage may appear minor within a council operation, residents have lost money, time and something that made their streets feel cared for.
She added: “Bedford Borough Council should apologise, fund the replanting and introduce a simple system identifying community-maintained spaces before further work is authorised.
“Replacing the plants alone will not resolve the underlying problem. Unless the council examines the communication, decision-making and pressure that allowed this to happen, the same failure can simply appear somewhere else in a different form.”.
A Bedford Borough Council spokesperson said: “We have been made aware of this after a complaint was received by the council; the area was strimmed and our staff carrying out this work made a mistake in the method of shrub maintenance used. We apologise to anyone whose plants were unnecessarily damaged or destroyed.
“Bedford Borough Council will replant shrub areas where necessary and allow regrowth were feasible.”