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| Packington Nook Residents’ Association | |
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Open letter to Bob Brown, Managing Director of Hallam Land Management
4th May 2009
Dear Mr Brown
I am interested in the
advertisement you placed in the Ashby Times this week, regarding
your land at Ashby de la Zouch, known as the Packington Nook
site. In my role as Chairman of the Packington Nook Residents'
Association, you will understand that we not only know the site
very well, but are fully aware of your plans and the current
status of the planning application.
Your advertisement requests
comments on a smaller development at this site, of 115 homes,
which you say may be standalone, or part of a phased approach to
reaching your target of over 1000 homes for the entire site. I
think you and I both know that the former of those options is
not one you are very serious about. We regard the
additional scheme as part of a twin-track approach you are
taking in respect of obtaining planning permission for the whole
site. It is a common approach of many developers in your
position. You have bought that land to build a lot more
than 115 homes.
There is an active and lively
debate within North West Leicestershire (as indeed throughout
the country) about housing growth and the district council has
spent a lot of time and money considering the options. Local
democracy is an important and fundamentally instituted part of
the infrastructure of our society in Britain. The chance for
elected local councillors to vote on both strategic plans and
individual planning applications is something we should
cherish.
As part of the planning
process, consultation with the public is very important and
that, of course, is why you retain a public relations company to
deal with that very delicate task. You will know that we have
helped you by asking over 3500 local people what they thought
about both your planning application and large scale development
of Ashby. The results are compelling - over 95% are against the
large scale development of Ashby and 98% are against building on
the Packington Nook Site. Feedback gathered at your own
consultations and presented as part of your application also, I
believe, made it very clear that people don't want development
at this site.
In the formal planning process,
conducted by North West Leicestershire District Council, not
only have many individual members of the public objected to your
application, but important statutory consultees including
Leicestershire County Council, the Environment Agency and the
Highways Agency, have outlined their serious reservations about
the site.
So you will understand that we
are unimpressed by your decision to bypass local democracy and
the due processes of a very busy planning department, by
referring the application to appeal with HM Planning
Inspectorate.
I therefore wish to ask, in
response to your advertisement, what you intend to do with
further comments regarding development at the Packington Nook
site, other than ignore them?
I
would like to help you with your public consultation and set up
an event that will allow you, personally, to gauge the opinions
of local people to your development plans. You are invited to
take part in a live public debate which will focus specifically
on your plans for the development of the Packington Nook site.
It will be you and me and the people of Ashby. There will be no
glossy leaflets, no public relations people and no planning
officers. We will find someone independent to chair the event
at which you and I will both make our cases and then we will
field questions from the public. I am sure that after this
first-hand experience you will understand, perhaps a little more
intimately, what people in Ashby think about your plans.
In organising this event,
perhaps I could ask that if we find a venue, you could then
cover the costs of the room hire? You see, we will be spending
our hard-earned money on contesting your appeal and further
applications.
I look forward to hearing from
you soon.
Yours sincerely
Nigel Garnham
Chairman
Packington Nook Residents'
Association
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