Sheffield sub-postmaster Nasar Raoof explains why he is worried that there are plans to plant new street trees near his business on Ecclesall Road, Banner Cross
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00:00 I'm on Eccles Hall Road speaking to Niaz Rauf who's the Postmaster at Banner Cross just
00:07 across the way from where we're standing. We're standing by, I'll just show people, we're
00:12 standing by some cones. Tell us why you're worried about the cones Niaz or what you think
00:17 about them. So a hole has magically appeared on Eccles Hall Road at Banner Cross and that
00:23 is because a tree is due to be planted here or so we are being told. We still have nothing
00:30 in confirmation. It's only thanks to local councillors that we've managed to find some
00:34 information out about this hole. But we're very worried on how we've got here. We were
00:41 told on the back of a tree-felling report by the council itself a number of years ago
00:46 that the trees on Russelton Road were taken down in an illegal fashion, an illegal fashion
00:51 and yet they told us they learned the lesson and here we are today with a hole in the ground
00:56 without any consultation with any of the businesses around here, without any form of consultation
01:01 with any form of views or opinions and magically one tree is going to be erected here and that
01:07 to us is a very shameful and dire state of affairs for the council when it cannot talk
01:13 to and consult the business owners on this road that have been treated with such disregard
01:18 and such contempt. And we're urgently calling for the council to actually come forward and
01:24 explain to us and the officers to explain to us why they've done this without talking
01:28 to us. We need to learn and move on as a city but it looks like from the tree-felling fiasco
01:34 a number of years ago the council in Sheffield has still not learned its lessons with consultation.
01:38 lessons because of it.
01:40 [BLANK_AUDIO]