Last week, a significant quantity of Yorkshire stone paving slabs were stolen from Chapel Lane in Headingley. The theft was able to take place because the stones had been lifted up as part of electricity works taking place on the street, and were left unsecured by the company responsible.

Local activist Penny Goodman has written to the Chief Executive Officer of the company concerned, Morrison Utility Services, to draw his attention to the problem and ask him to take action. You can read her letter in full below. We will report back here if we receive any response.

Dear Mr. Morrison,

I am writing to raise a concern about the professional practices of your workmen in relation to work currently taking place on Chapel Lane in Headingley, Leeds, LS6 3BW.

Last week, the Yorkshire stone paving along the lower part of Chapel Lane was lifted by your company in order to conduct electricity works on behalf of Northern Powergrid (Yorkshire) plc. I have attached pictures of the site. The stone paving slabs were stacked at the side of the road, with no measures taken to secure them.

As you are probably aware, theft of Yorkshire stone is a serious issue in Leeds. Over the last year, West Yorkshire police have recorded an 18% rise in incidences of Yorkshire stone theft, and Leeds City Council have had to replace £50,000 of stone stolen from the city’s pavements. It is an organised crime, and currently on the rise.

Residents of Chapel Lane were therefore very concerned to see their historic paving stone left unsecured at the side of the road by your workmen. Chapel Lane is part of the Headingley conservation area, and as such its Yorkshire stone paving is recognised as part of the area’s unique local heritage. However, in this case, that heritage has now been lost due to the negligent actions of your company. All of the unsecured stone paving has been taken, most of it in two visits on Friday February 19th.

On one of these two occasions, a local resident witnessed the crime in progress, took the registration number of the vehicle being used, and reported it to the police. We can therefore hold out some hope that the criminals may be caught. However, the fact remains that this theft would not have been possible in the first place if your workmen had taken due care of the historic paving stones, instead of leaving them unsecured at the side of the road.

One of the residents whom I spoke to about this matter over the weekend reported that she had telephoned the emergency number provided on your safety barriers to report the theft and raise her concerns. Eventually, she received a call back from Tony Porter, your reinstatement agent, who said that Yorkshire stone paving is usually taken to the depot for safekeeping during work of this kind. However, on this occasion he did not know its whereabouts, and agreed that it had probably been stolen. This tells me that your normal protocol is to take actions to secure historic paving materials, but that on this occasion the protocol failed.

I would therefore like to ask you to review your working practices, to ensure that they do not allow this kind of devastating loss of unique local heritage to happen again in the future. I would also suggest that on this occasion you should undertake to compensate the Headingley community for its losses by offering to pay the cost of replacing these particular paving stones with new Yorkshire stone slabs to Leeds City Council.

I would appreciate your swift reply on how you will be responding to this issue.

Yours sincerely,

Penny Goodman
Liberal Democrat candidate for Headingley ward