UK: Village is at war over council’s £100,000 plan to move allotments with plotholders accused of rigging poll against the move
‘I have an open mind to the proposal but I do have serious concerns about the way it has been handled by the parish council.’
By Laurence Dollimore
Daily Mail
Aug 5, 2021
Excerpt:
An online poll to decide on moving a village’s allotment site has been scrapped after suspicious votes flooded in from Russia and around the world.
Organisers claim gardeners opposed to re-locating the plots in Bearsted, Kent, manipulated their IP addresses to repeatedly cast votes against the project.
Bearsted Parish Council’s £100,000 proposal would see the allotments moved, creating more plots, while extending a nearby car park and providing two new tennis courts which would be paid for by Bearsted and Thurnham Lawn Tennis Club.
The number of allotments would be increased from 27 to 48, while toilets and a dementia-friendly and children’s garden would be added at the new site.
But a poll to decide on the idea was taken down within two days after organisers noticed a flood of votes coming in from around the globe.
Opponents of the plan are accused of rigging the poll by using IP addresses from countries such as Russia, Albania, Australia, Bosnia, Brazil, Canada, Argentina, Costa Rica and Cyprus to increase the number of ‘anti’ votes.
The Support Bearsted Community Projects website said within a day of its poll opening, a ‘no’ vote was being submitted every 30 seconds ‘for a sustained period of time’.
