Senior councillors set date to consider mosque decision

A date has been set for senior councillors to look again at whether to allow a disused library to become a mosque. 

A decision to grant a 30-year lease on the former Abergavenny library was approved in May before being put on hold pending review by a council scrutiny committee, which met last week, and said the decision had to go back to the cabinet within 10 working days. 

Just days before the scrutiny committee took place the words ‘No Masjid’ and crosses were spray painted on to the grade II listed building with police investigating the criminal damage as a hate crime. Masjid is Arabic for place of worship or mosque. 

Monmouthshire council’s Labour-led cabinet will now consider the arguments made at the place scrutiny committee when it meets for its regular meeting on Wednesday, June 25 and must decide whether to stand by its original decision or reconsider it. 

The scrutiny committee heard from Abergavenny mayor Philip Bowyer and town council colleague Gareth Wild, a Baptist minister, who both spoke in favour of the cabinet’s decision to grant the lease to the Monmouthshire Muslim Community Association. 

Four public speakers, including Sarah Chicken the warden of the almshouses next door to the former library, a resident, and Andrew Powell landlord of the nearby Groefield pub objected to the decision, citing reasons such as parking and potential for noise as to why a mosque and community centre would be unsuitable. 

Cabinet member Ben Callard, who lives near the proposed mosque and represents the area on the town council though he is the county councillor for Llanfoist and Govilon, explained no planning permission is required. Community centres and places of worship fall under the same planning use as a library. 

But he said the community association had promised to hold a public consultation on its plans, but that was criticised by councillors who called the decision in for review, as it was “consultation after the decision”. 

The review was instigated by Conservative councillors Rachel Buckler and Louise Brown, who represent Devauden and Shirenewton, and Llanelly Hill independent Simon Howarth who questioned how the decision was made. They faced criticism as Abergavenny councillors and the town council backed the original decision. 

The three questioned the council’s process and complained there had been no scrutiny of the decision. Cllr Callard said the community association’s bid was the highest scoring tender, and the £6,000 a year rent similar to one of the other bids, and rejected the idea it would be practical for the council to operate as a landlord if every lease had to go through a full scrutiny process. 

Cllr Callard also said if councillors disagreed with it offering the building for new uses, as it was no longer used as a pupil referral unit with the library having transferred to the town hall in 2015, the decision made last November to declare it “surplus to requirements” should have been called in for review. 

The cabinet will consider the scrutiny committee’s suggestions a re-tender should be run with specifications including an independent valuation, a survey of the building, consideration of the building’s history and importance, a public consultation and the possibility of selling the building, when it meets at County Hall in Usk at 4.30pm.