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2 Don't take us for fools in Whalley!


^ IT matters not to me whether anyone has lived in Whalley for one day or,


w in my personal circumstance, over 51 K years. '


..............


^ The choice remains the same. We live in Whalley because it is an attrac­ tive place to live;


Last week’s Clitheroe Advertiser


front page story - “Fresh 350 home plan for Whalley” - did not surprise me. I say this because I have been doing my homework in recent days. It was only a matter of time before the story broke. However 1 deal in the truth. I am pleased with my own development contribution to my vil­ lage, having been the most active, in­ dependent, local property developer within Whalley’s settlement boundary since my first development in 1986. Thirty-six residential homes in


Whalley (plus four bungalows in nearby Billington for good measure) and the development of The Sidings Business Park have my fingerprints on the various planning applications. However with these applications I have on occasions had to take some


^ flak. It has to be said I have had some P healthy debates with my fellow resi- ^ dents from time to time, but I have ^ never ever sunk to the depths of mis- P representation that have been set out on the public record by Mr Steve McBurney, the nominated mouth­


piece for the London company Com­ mercial Estates Group Ltd.


i He is on the record as saying:


g “Whalley has seen piecemeal devel- » opments over the years which do not I deliver real benefit to the local com- . munity. We believe a larger well-de- P signed scheme - with inputs from the community—will deliver genuine and comprehensive benefitsifo the vil­ lage.” Excuseme, but I respectfully dissent from his view,


'.tt Having grossly’Insulfed my ef- . . fi>*r i??ri i ^ l S i f-s : -ip?-* \\l.


forts and everyone else’s, whether it has been a house extension or a new build, Mr McBumey, safe in his Lon­ don office, goes on to glibly patronise every person in my community and beyond-because the principles which I shall go on to explain apply not only to Whalley, but also to Clitheroe,


Longridge and potentially the entire Ribble V a l le y / - . : -S Men like Mr McBurney are inter­


hng party of GVH is Barclays Wealth Trustees (Jersey) Limited (another haven), which is a trustee


of the Dooba Settlement a life inter­


est tmst for someone or other. Then there is Mr McBurney’s era-


Ltd (LEG). 1 shed a tear as it report­ ed losses of £2,725,193 in the trading year to September 30th, 2009, blam­ ing of course the recession, but an in­


f Estates Group


jection of £4,000,000 non-redeemable ordinary shares by Dooba (Gibral- tcu) Ho dings Ltd kept the CEG ship


-afloat. What a shamel So fellow residents of Whalley the


people who are actively going to bet- our village are not men like Mr


McBurney, but the directors of GVH and Its associated companies. I shall name them for you then we all know who our genuine opposition is when they all no doubt have the courage to come to Whalley and make their pub- lie presentation in person. - I can’t wait. I can ask them face to face why my piecemeal developments have not delivered any real benefit to my community. Thinking about It, better still I’ll add their addresses then perhaps we can discuss together ■ whether we can secure some options on the green fields adjacent to where they live. After all they think we are simple Lancashire pie munchers so we must show them that we have a bit of muscle in the right places. So in pole position we have the


main man (although not a Director of GVH) Mr Gerard Versteegh, 20


Caihcan Road, London, SWIO 9NN; followed by James Andrew Scott, 2


Glenfields, West End Lane, Stoke Po- ges, Buckinghamshire, SL24LS; Giles Robert Bryant Wilson, Graingers, 14 Oakley Gardens, Brockham Park, Betchworth, Surrey, RH3 7AZ; and last but not least Andrew Michael Woods, Rosehill Farmhouse, Rose- hill, Stone cum Ebony, Tenterden, Kent,TO307HH. .


'


Don’t most of their addresses ere-, ate an ambience of peace and tran-


ested in one thing- windfall profit from targeted speculation of agricul­ tural land. So Mr McBurney this is the truth. I am not stupid. Neither are my fellow residents in Whalley and ■ the wonderful Ribble.Valley. ; - On August 13th this year Lawson-


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steads landowner and local fanner Mr Alan Coates entered into a market- mg/advertising agreement with Ger­ ard Versteegh Holdings Ltd (GVH). 1 do hot know the precise details of the contract,_but I respectfully invite GVH to clarifylhe terms of the con­ tract so we, the residents of Whalley, can fairly assess yoiir potential final reward. It is of fundamental impor­ tance for the Develoment Framework procedure we the village residents currently find ourselves party to. . As for, Mr Gerard Versteegh, he IS a reputedly wealthy individual and Swedish national; GVH has a parent ^mpany called Dooba: (Gibraltar) , Holdings Ltd which, surprise surprise, • IS mcorporated in the tax haven that is Gibraltan.The ultimate parent com­ pany is Dooba Holdings Ltd, which i s , incorporated in sunny.Cyprus. It gets better though as the ultimate control-


■ quility in the English countryside. Well to quote Mr McBurney, their mouthpiece, I too believe a larger, well-designed scheme - with inputs from the community - will deliver genuine and comprehensive benefits to.'. Stoke Poges or Betchworth, or Stone cum Ebony. Surely you lot aren’t pa|d up members of the Not In My Backyard community? Let’s get a Lawsonsteads-type scheme into place down your way. I think I am correct in saying that Calderstones Park had 318 residen-


; tial properties with another 39 under: construction, giving a total of 357. So


■another development about the size of Calderstones Park beckons in area of tremendous visual amenity. I have


.every confidence that Ribble 'Valley ,. Borough Councillors will reject any scheme. However, planning appeal inspectors may take a different view. I have a simple solution arid through' the medium that is The Clitheroe


ClIthGroeAdvertlser&Times,Thursday,Novemberd,2010 25


: ■ Write to The Editor, Clitheroe Advertiser and Times,'3 King : ' Street, ClitFieroe or email:


>1


: ~ duncan.smith@eastlancsnews.co.uk ■ Follow tfiG dGbatG at www.clithGroGadvGrtisGr.co.uk


those directly affected by such devel­ opment. Simple and straightforward.' If you think that is a good idea then


please e-mail our MP Nigel Evans ac­ cordingly. . Whilst tvriting I will also state my


personal view on housing consent in Whalley. We need a few more. The areas that should be allocated for af­ fordable housing only are (1) Lanca­ shire County Council depot on Rid- dings Lane, which could move to the A59 at Barrow Brook. The village would lose HGV traffic whilst gaining ‘ residential traffic. Neutral effect. (2)


. The haulage depot, formerly Barnes and Tipping Ltd, on Mitton Road


• for the same reasons. Both sites are brown field and neither site would af­ fect the known drainage difficulties on


King Street as no excess surface water would go that way.


Finally whilst I think that the


present CWS application on the field adjacent to The Sidings Busi­ ness Park (which my company owns) may be difficult to resist for some residential consent, it appears to me to be too intensive at 80 residential units, but more worryingly is poten­ tially an unlawful application as pres­ ently presented. Those three sites would be Whalley’s contribution for the next decade as a bare minimum. The London Swede and turnip heads can therefore be sent packing from whence they came for being guilty of tiying to make a quick coin at our vil- . lage’s expense.


ANDREW RONNAN, The Arches, Whalley


So what's wrong with piecemeal?


LAST week you published a comment from Mr McBurney, a spokesman for the Commercial Estates Group


■ (*-EG) about his hopes for develop­ ing the Lawsonsteads fields. Mr McBurney, a development


'


, from miles around. It is a landscape of outstanding natural beauty, far more beautiful than the vast tracts of deso-: lation in the Trough of Rowland that


. .Ribble Valley Borough Council think warrant official AONB status. If this;- land is vulnerable to the kind of de- velopment that CEG clearly have in


: mind then it is in urgent need of some- statutoiy protection.


. : , ,


D.G.SWINDELLS, Whallcy Old Road, : Billington


We need a united


front on building IT was pleasing to read in last week’s letters that both Whalley borough councillors are mindful of local op­ position to the current co-op housing development.


In the same edition appeared the


official planning notice, specifically declaring the number of dwellings as “80 maximum”.


The actual plan, which did not ap­


pear, includes areas providing access to further co-op land which the coun­ cil’s own strategy document desig-. nates as suitable for up to 400 houses. Only two weeks ago, Coun. Rawson


also wrote to this column describing developers as “opportunistic”, but failed to point out that it is RVBC, of which he is the leader, that presented this opportunity to them on a plate. He goes on to promise to protect and enhance the village. If, by protection, he means a cocoon of planning dis­ asters, then I dread to think what he considers as enhancement. A continuing stream of develop­


ments in Billington, Barrow, Clithe­ roe and Whalley means that council­ lors from eveiy ward and parish need :: to unite in rejecting large scale plans


which will affect the whole valley. We need them to stand firm, or they may be disappointed when standing for re- election.


planner, said that Whalley’s piece­ meal development over the years had not delivered “real benefit” for the people of Whalley. Real benefit, he -


. implied, could only come from having a big development, hopefully a very


big development, carried out by his company.


Mr McBurney’s comments about Whalley’s historic development gives


■ us a revealing insight into the mind of the academic planner. It never seemed to have crossed his mind that piecemeal development is how every - English village has evolved over the- centuries and which makes the Eng­ lish village one of the glories of Eng­ land’s architectural landscape'. ■What makes his proposals even


more preppstorous is that he wants to build on land that helps to give'^al-


. Advertiser I put it to Nigel Evans MP for consideration to take to his fellow Members, of Parliament for debate : thereupon.


The government quickly introduces .


a Statutory Instrument whereby all parcels of land presently designated : as open countryside and upon which option instruments have been entered into are duly barred from any altema- ■ tive planning consent for at least the - next 20 years, because there is a de facto risk that new (and therefore ‘ inexperienced) Development Frame­ work procedures are going to be com­ promised by the abject greed of peo- ' i pie who invariably live far away from


' leyjts unique character, a character which Ribble Valley planners never


; tire of telling us they want to respect and protect.


. ; Whalley’s architectural inheritance :■ ■. ’ .


is not dissimilar to many other large ' English villages. What makes Whalley unique and such an asset to the Ribble Valley landscape is its setting. Whal- ley’s special character is nothing with­ out the broad belt of countiyside that rises from the heart of the village at Lawsonsteads and sweeps round over


. Clerk Hill and the site of the Iron Age ’ fort at Portfield, down through Sir


John’s Wood and across the fields of the Calder before rising again to the


Nab. Lawsonsteads is an integral'part - of this historic landscape; It is visible


■ ■' ANDREW HARPER, . ;


The Square, ■ Whalley


Beware of their


‘honeyed words' NO sooner have the people of Whal­


ley expressed their clear opposition to housing expansion in the village than a developer comes fonvard to propose hundreds of new homes. . . . ; As a relative newcomer,listening


: to the views expressed at the recent public meeting, I was struck how


. reasonably the case against such de­ velopments was expressed, not least the argument that we should preserve Whalley as a village for thousands of


visitors, as well as residents, to enjoy. ' But now the Commercial Estates


Group is using its muscle to build at Lawsonsteads Farm. -


;; .


. Their plans described iii your pa­ per last week appear, on the surface, • to answer the public’s concerns. But beware the honeyed words of a com­ mercial developer! Gf course they will ■ claim theirplans are wonderful. After all, big profits are riding on them. ; But our case is against any devel­ opment o f this scale, whatever they might claim to offer in return. Now a glossy leaflet has dropped through our letterboxes, inviting us to attend consultation meetings.


, I plan to go, to express my complete opposition, but past experience tells


me the,consultation will be a purely cosmetic exercise. Commercial Estates, and the Coun­


cil, which has the power to say no, are - already aware of our views. We expect the Council to support us. ' MICHAEL WEDGEWORTH, KingStrcct, VVhallcy


Builders - keep


off the grass! THE decision seems to have already been made to allow building on green field land across the Ribble Valley.


Gf the options provided by the Core


Strategy, none of them involves allow­ ing building only on brown field sites to protect the Ribble Valley’s rural environment and prevent it from be­ coming just another urban sprawl. I asked the panel at the public con­


sultation if an assessment had been made whether existing brown field land in the Ribble Valley is sufficient to accommodate the required extra housing, but they couldn’t provide an answer. I suppose the simple truth is that it’s much easier and cheaper for developers to build on green field than anywhere else, not having to concern themselves with demolition, checking pollutant levels, paying VAT on reno­ vating old building, etc. I also asked the panel about the Fort


Grange site, a recently-demolished factory providing lots of space for


new housing, which last I heard was earmarked to become a race course. Again I received no clear response to this, a lack of clarity in keeping with the Core Strategy document itself. ; The Core Strategy is a highly divi­


sive plan, pitting villages and towns against each other in a struggle to gain the least number of houses in a kind of reverse-psychology Monopoly. I think


they also call it Divide and Rule. I wonder how many people feel the


same way as I do, that new houses should be built on existing brown field sites or not at all? That way we could say to the Government “this many and no more”. We would be in the driving seat, not being driven. Of course,'such a plan would re­


quire some iriiagination: for instance, converting mills into flats, building houses on ex-factoiy sites and multi­


level accommodation. In this way we may well be able to meet the required


development target r- if that’s what it is-without spoiling what is the Ribble'


Valley’s greatest asset: its open spaces (af least some of which could be used to grow_ crops in this age of increasing food insecurity). ' -


, , I’d be interested to see how many '


people across the Ribble Valley share my opinion. If you support a bottom line of no'green field development anywhere in the Ribble Valley, then please drop me a line at jasonjgreenr


wood@yahoo.com, including which area you live in. Tm a private resident of the Ribble


Valley and I don’t represent any or­ ganisation. I live in Low Moor and an


. option of the Core Strategy is to build .on the fields that separate the village ’ from the town to effectively create a Greater Clitheroe. I consider myself


a NIMBG rather than a NIMBY; Not


quite as catchy a title but the Ribble Valley is our “back garden”. I’d hate


to see it,become just another back yard. ■


■ ' • :


JASON GREENWOOD, Low Moor


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