Worth a listen here:
http://powcampaign.org/bbc-surrey-interview-chris-britton-pow

Just when you thought it was all over bar the shouting – now Waverley’s Local Plan could get Daft again!! Let the shouting begin?

Those scourge of developers – the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and Protect our little corner of Waverley (PoW) – have reared their ugly heads again and a Milford couple who don’t want to overlook 180 homes near a railway station at Milford Golf Course, – have joined in!

Whilst the rest of us were busy hunting Easter Eggs and tucking into roast lamb,  the indefatigable mob above were busy finessing their latest objections to development in Waverley by preparing legal challenges to halt the Local Plan.

The doors to developers open?

Just what is it that makes these people think their little corner of the country should be exempt from the need to build more housing countrywide? Seriously, folks, they need to pause, take a deep breath and accept defeat with grace before, in their desperation to stop the Local Plan (a blueprint for development for the next 15 years) in its tracks, they throw open the doors to the borough to each and every developer with an eye to the main chance! Those who won’t hesitate to take advantage of Waverley’s weakness if it doesn’t have a Local Plan in place to protect it!

There can be little doubt in anyone’s mind that whilst the primary aim of CPRE, PoW and Co, is to undermine the housing numbers set out in the Local Plan there is a sub-plot here to undermine the recent decision in respect of Dunsfold Park. No one is in any doubt that politics lay behind the decision by the Secretary of State to call in the Dunsfold Aerodrome application – after all, Mistress Milton was shouting from the roof-tops that she’d whipped Javid into doing her bidding – but, for once, it seems that Party Politics was placed above Local Politics. 

Moaning Milton-moans on…and on.. “I want a huge industrial estate at Dunsfold.”

Fortunately, SJ didn’t, ultimately, do what Moaning-Milton wanted. Instead he acted impartially, weighing the contradictory evidence submitted by the Dunsfold Developer and the Rule Six Parties (AKA PoW and the Parishes) and concluded in the memorable words of the Dunsfold Developer’s QC, Christopher Katkowski, that PoW and the Parishes were a bunch of ‘hypocrites’, who, when one got down to brass tacks, were objecting to the fact that those who would eventually live in the proposed new village would be living more sustainably than they themselves are living!

Seriously, folks, perverting the course of the Local Plan should be made a civil offence. Without going into all the gory details – yet again – there can be little doubt that its attempted persecution is maliciously motivated and if they succeed in finding a legal loophole in the Local Plan, once it’s been torn up and cast to the four winds, lets hope CPRE and PoW  ask the people of Cranleigh, Ewhurst and all the other villages in the East how they feel about their fields and gardens being built on?

‘Your Waverley’ is being dragged through the Courts, for the sin of obeying the Government’s ruling –  to build homes the country needs. If they don’t do it – then the Government will find someone who will!!

Meanwhile, those who can afford these vexatious challenges will be contemplating packing their suitcases and moving to greener pastures, because they can.

Whilst for those of us left behind the ordeal is far from over …

P.S

Councillor ‘By-Pass Brmley’Byham is helping out the Bramley Neighbourhood Plan. The village on the A281 has allocated sites on the Green Belt for building, but he is moaning to the locals that Waverley officers won’t let them. 

Bet we have a pretty good idea where that Green Belt site is! Bet Fred, it belongs to one of his mates  – like the last one he supported in his village!