Petition calls for tighter control of fair

9:37am Wednesday 3rd December 2008

AN EDEN community is calling for greater controls to be imposed on the annual Appleby Horse Fair because, they say, it is disrupting their daily lives.

More than 500 people have put their names to a petition calling for greater policing the increasingly popular gathering, which attracts thousands of gipsies and travellers to the town every June.

Eric Fleming, who has campaigned against the fair since 1953, and who has organised the petition, said the scale of the event was becoming unbearable for residents.

“It has got bigger and bigger and bigger,” he said. “More businesses close than stay open now so you cannot say it brings business into the town, it causes a lot of mess.”

Mr Fleming was responding to the news that the Multi Agency Strategic Co-ordinating Group (MASCG) – consisting of representatives from Eden District Council, Cumbria County Council, the Environment Agency, the police, ambulance and fire and rescue services, RSPCA and NHS Cumbria – aims to bring better organisation to the 323-year-old event.

“It has got so big and they have got so many complaints that they (MASCG) are trying to control it but I can’t see how they can do it,” he said.

“If it is still a lot of noise and carry-on this year. There will be more protests. The local people have had enough. People’s gardens are used as toilets. We just want some control because it is just running wild.”

Mr Fleming said one of the biggest frustrations caused by the fair was revellers arriving up to a week before the event begins, creating traffic and parking problems for residents.

“They come early, there are so many people about. Some people can’t get their cars out, they just park anywhere, right outside your house, blocking your drive. The roads are blocked.”

Mr Fleming said he is going to submit the petition containing residents’ concerns to David Maclean, MP for Penrith and The Border.

Mr Maclean said he thought the fair could be brought under tighter control by the MASCG within four years.

“I am very happy to have the petition,” he said. “There are a range of issues, policing is just part of it. There needs to be a bigger grip on the fair.

“There are safety questions on the animals and the public, and cracking down on crime. We think it could be done over a period of three or four years. We had a similar problem in Melmerby and they managed to crack down on it.”