When politicians say something should never be used as a political football, you know it’s about to become precisely that.

So it proved today when Councillor Gareth Dadd, the Conservative deputy leader of North Yorkshire Council, uttered the phrase today (July 2) at a cabinet meeting of York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority.

Government plans to create an asylum centre to house 1,200 males at Linton-on-Ouse, nine miles from Boroughbridge, weren’t on the agenda.

But it didn’t take long for the subject to arise.

“This should never ever be a party political football,” said Cllr Dadd. “We can all unite around the fact that Linton-on-Ouse was and remains one of the most inappropriate locations to house asylum seekers.”

He then accused Labour deputy mayor Jo Coles of blaming North Yorkshire Council for failing to finalise a local plan, which could have avoided the threat to Linton, and of obstructing plans by mayor David Skaith to make the former airbase a mayoral development zone.

Mr Skaith wants to create three mayoral development zones, backed by £10 million, for regeneration schemes in York, Scarborough and Selby.

“I was never aware that there was a formal approach to North Yorkshire Council to designate Linton-on-Ouse a mayoral development zone”, said Cllr Dadd.

Mr Skaith said the Linton base had been empty since 2020 and North Yorkshire Council had had “opportunity and time to bring a plan forward on what that site could be used for”. 

Political chokehold

Sensing his gotcha moment, Cllr Dadd said if the mayor had previously wanted Linton to become a mayoral development zone then the combined authority should agree to add it to the list being voted on today.

The combined authority cabinet includes only one other Tory — North Yorkshire Council leader Cllr Carl Les — so the suggestion was never likely to succeed.

But it gave Cllr Dadd the chance to put Labour in a political chokehold.

“Surely this gives us the opportunity to put Linton-on-Ouse as a mayoral development zone — if what the deputy mayor has written is correct that you sought to do that previously," he said.

“Either she is correct, and we have the opportunity to do it, or she isn’t correct and you clarify that.”

Mr Skaith said the meeting “probably can’t move on that now” and called a five-minute adjournment “so we can discuss this wider”.

'Policy on the hoof'

When the meeting reconvened 35 minutes later, Cllr Bob Webb, the Labour deputy leader of City of York Council, accused Cllr Dadd of making “policy on the hoof” and claimed the amendment might even harm the Linton cause.

He said the cabinet needed to “make sure this is the best possible piece of work for our residents rather than just a political statement”.

Mr Skaith said Cllr Dadd had not given advance notification of the amendment and it was “not an appropriate way to work”.

Undeterred, Cllr Dadd pressed on:

“If what the deputy mayor has stated is true — and you have said nothing to the contrary — you Mr Mayor were proposing this as a mayoral development zone in its own right. Either you were or you weren’t. Either the deputy mayor is correct is correct or she is incorrect."

Mr Skaith replied:

“It’s not appropriate to get into the wider letter in this forum currently but Jo does have my full support and we will take away with officers the opportunities around Linton most likely at the September combined authority meeting.”

Local plan row

The jousting then returned to criticism of how long it is taking North Yorkshire Council to create a local plan, which outlines where development can take place. The local authority was founded in 2023 and expects to have a plan ready in 2029.

“You can’t just magic allocations of land", said Cllr Dadd, who described dealing with legal threats, North Yorkshire’s vast geography and the tripling of the government’s housing target as a “mountainous task”.

He asked Cllr Claire Douglas, the Labour leader of City of York Council, how long it had taken to create its local plan.

“It took seven years but that’s not the environment we operate in now,” she replied. “I don’t use my previous experience as an example. What I’m looking to is the future of plan-making.”

The football continued to be kicked back and forth until, inevitably, the Labour cabinet members — who outnumber the Tories by four to two — voted against Cllr Dadd’s amendment.

When the combined authority was set up in 2024, there was much talk on both sides of working constructively. But after two years, the uneasy relationship between Labour and the Conservatives appears to have broken down entirely.