There’s a particularly irritating argument you frequently spot in stories about people – I shan’t call them Nimbys; apparently that’s a slur now – opposing building projects near them. Here’s a good example now, from a BBC news story about a proposed logistics park in Suffolk: “I think local planning is all done just to give local people the illusion that their opinion counts, because what they’ve done is inconsiderate and disrespectful.” Or consider this Guardian report of a public meeting last autumn, packed with people outraged at the idea that the All England Tennis Club, host of Wimbledon, might build more courts on a [checks notes] private golf course.
Can you see the hand wave, the trick of the mind people slip into so naturally they don’t even realise they’re doing it? They’re saying they’re not being listened to, when what they actually mean is they’re not given a veto. (“Listening” does not have to entail agreement.) Planning decisions are more extensively consulted on than almost any other state activity: few in government are going around actively asking for your views regarding every slight change to the health service or matters of war and peace. Yet these attempts to solicit opinions don’t make people feel like they’re listened to: it somehow does the opposite.
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