Joy of Christmas

A TOP business figure has threatened to chain herself to railings if a Suffolk council sells off its Christmas lights.

Although the Christmas lights will be shining this year, Bury St Edmunds Town Council has given interested parties until the end of February to come forward and take the town’s Christmas lights off its hands.

If nobody comes forward the lights will be sold. Next year, the town council’s involvement with the lights will end.

Chrissy Harrod, president of Bury St Edmunds Chamber of Commerce said she would be “absolutely appalled” if the council gave the lights away or sold them to the highest bidder and threatened to chain herself to the railings of the council offices in Guildhall Street if it pursued its plan.

“I am not being flippant,” she said. “It is public money which has paid for them and it would be an irresponsible use of public money to sell them off for peanuts or give them away.

“I completely understand why they have relinquished responsibility for the lights. The problem with the lights is they are very expensive – in testing, fixings and insurance. However, the town council took responsibility for Christmas lights and it is a responsibility they hold.”

Mrs Harrod called on the council to seek other organisations, including St Edmundsbury Borough Council, the chamber of commerce, which might be able to work together to lay on the lights in future years.

She added business in the town would be unlikely to want to pay for the lights themselves because many town centre traders were already struggling in the face of high rents and rates.

A borough council spokeswoman has said “A report about Christmas lights will go to the Bury St Edmunds Town Council working party later this year.”

Town council leader Roy Bebbington said the council simply could not afford to keep running or looking after the lights.

He said: “It is just a spiralling expense. Mrs Harrod can do that (chain herself to the railings), but this is a case of needs must. They are very expensive to store and we are not planning to keep the offices forever and alternative storage would be in the region of £5,000 a year.”

He said the second lights had been valued by a number of firms at between about £10,000 and £20,000 but he feared the three-year-old set would fetch considerably less than that.

As a result, he said, it could end up being cheaper to give them away than pay the £5,000 a year storage costs. “The town council was unwise to clamour for these lights when the borough council got rid of them.”

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