Monday 23 September 2013

Action Group photos in an official AI report - whatever next?!

Someone said "Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery". Perhaps that's going a bit far, but imagine our surprise when an official Aggregate Industries Report: Test Pitting & Plant Trial Summary, supplied to a local councillor, contained our photographs.

We always try to make it a habit of attributing our sources, and of asking permission before publishing any of AI's reports and drawings; a number of AI items have been held back accordingly. The photographs AI pass off as their own do appear on our website, but that's the website with © Straitgate Action Group at the bottom.

And it's not the first time either. Consultants have been found using our maps, again with copies finding their way into official reports. Are we making life easier for AI? This is not our intention. Our intention is to get the facts about the area into the wider domain, to show the raft of constraints to a quarrying operation, to make sure - if a quarry should ever transpire - it would be done properly… and with sensitivity - if that were ever possible - to the surroundings.

Our intention is not to make life easier for a global cement conglomerate. Use your own pictures and maps! Or at the very least ask permission.