Walsall councillor calls for sensitivity over approved billboards near war memorial

Walsall Council gave TCL Structures Ltd permission to install three advertising boards on the perimeter of their development, one of them near the Lichfield Road memorial.

Currently the perimeter of the site is surrounded by 2.4-metre high hoarding. The advertising boards, which will display the proposed development, will be seven metres high and six metres wide.

Councillor Adam Hicken, who also serves as the council’s Armed Forces Champion, has written to the company urging it to be sensitive in its placements of the boards.

He said: “To have one right behind the war memorial, ultimately, would be disrespectful.

“If you stand here, come Remembrance Day and you can imagine what it’s going to look like. It’s going to be a great big thing there.

“It’s one thing to have permission to do something, but could you do it in a way that’s more acceptable?”

The war memorial plaque was taken from the New Invention Methodist Church before it closed. The names listed are of those who had fallen from the New Invention area.

Councillor Hicken added: “This is specifically those who fell in the Great War in New Invention. It is that local point where people can go and recognise the names.

“On remembrance, people come and gather, and obviously it’s going to be very different if all of a sudden you’ve got a great big billboard directly behind the war memorial.

“You’ve got your permission, that’s fine. But please do that in a sensitive way as well.”

TCL Structures said it had not yet received Councillor Hicken’s letter, but said the development was not directly behind the memorial.

A spokesperson said: “There will be three boards going up, I can’t see any that would be directly behind the memorial.”