A win, win (From The Oxford Times)

A win, win

6:10am Thursday 18th December 2008

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We share the delight of everyone at the resolution of the conflict over the future of Radley Lakes.

The battle between protestors trying to protect the lakes and RWE npower, which was seeking to assert what it believed was its right to use the lake to dispose of fuel ash, was one of the most acrimonious of recent years.

So acrimonious did it become that npower resorted to using heavy tactics to defend the site, including the use of the courts against protesters, amid claims that some campaigners were exceeding the law.

For certain, relations between npower and its community were strained. Indeed, relations between npower and the local media, including this newspaper, were strained too as the effects of court action appeared to encompass the media.

This week, there has been an outbreak of harmony. npower’s efforts to find a long-term alternative to Radley Lakes are laudable. Its gesture to offer the site to the local community to be managed as a nature reserve is a generous one. It will go a long way to repairing the damage of the last few years.

In the words of one of the leading campaigners, the issue has been transformed into a ‘win, win’.

If only all the disputes we report could be so happily resolved.

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