Government paid charity to produce eco-town 'fact' leaflets

Gordon Brown's eco-towns scheme was embroiled in new controversy last night as a housing charity admitted it had been paid to produce information leaflets setting out the Government's case. Shelter, one of the few organisations backing the plan to build new towns in the English countryside, said it had been given £100,000 by the Government to publish a series of 13 pamphlets, one for each proposed eco-town site. Click for more...

Nice to see Gordon Brown diverting taxpayers money for government propaganda - he is a very desperate man! I would be most interested to know if Shelter have received any Lottery funding in the last few months?

Cabe slams schemes by eco-towns architect

Cabe has slammed two residential schemes designed by Barton Willmore comprising more than 7,000 homes between them. Shadow housing minister Grant Shapps said the reviews set “alarm bells ringing” because Barton Willmore is also designing two of the government’s proposed eco-towns.Click for more...

I wonder what Cabe will make of the Ford Eco Town proposal?

Caroline Flint apologises over Brownfield misinformation

Sadly not for Ford - but I think it clearly emphasises how concerned the DCLG were to mislead the public about the amount of Brownfield land to be covered in the Eco Towns.

An Eco Con indeed!

http://www.birminghammail.net/news/top-stories/2008/09/03/michael-fabricant-wins-government-apology-over-eco-town-plan-advert-97319-21667981/

Less than 30 days...

There is still time to sign the petition...

You can download it or sign online here...

Do it now - the clock is ticking...

Is Flint listening?

Caroline Flint has asked people all over the country to write and email with their concerns regarding the Eco-Town shortlist. This was to be a democratic public consultation, however, for some reason her department has fallen silent on the matter.

I wrote several letters to Ms Flint who has chosen not to responded to any of my concerns. It appears Ms Flint and Labour are ignoring the facts that eco-towns in some areas are unwanted and unconvincing, despite the green bodge job glossed over this absurd idea.

We had only three months to voice our concerns... Everyday I wait for a response... Its been several months now Ms Flint... Is this democratic and fair?

Hi Mr. Gummidge. Hope you had a good summer.

I am trying to comment on the Does Caroline Folint Listen entry in the Blog but, as usual, stumble when I have to enter my password and user name - which is never recognised. However, perhaps you would be kind enough to print my comment below on that entry. Many thanks, Tricia Wales

I too have written to ms Flint on several occasions and have sent a copy of each letter to Gordon Brown. I have received two letters from 10 Downing Street thanking me and acknowledging the copy letters I have sent, but surprise surprise not a dicky bird from Caroline Flint Which shows what an ignorant, uneducated individual we are dealing with here, who is without even basic common courtesy or manners!

OFFICIAL - Only 50 Hectares of Brownfield land in whole of Arun District

The Department for Communities and Local Government today released figures on the amount of land which is previously developed etc (Brownfield) which may be available for housing and other development (Technology parks, marinas, parkway stations etc etc).

Report here:- http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/corporate/pdf/945914.pdf

Interestingly for the whole of Arun district, there is only 13ha previously developed land, 26ha land currently in use but with potential for housing development and (with other categories) - makes a total of only 50 ha in the whole district.- From Ferring to Pagham, and Littlehampton to Findon.

Now, our friends at Ford Airfield Vision Group (a misnomer if ever I heard one) and Ford Enterprise Hub, claim their (eco) new town covers 350ha, which even if all this identified "brownfield" land is at Ford, and within the curtilage of the land their greedy farmers wish to concrete over; that is only 1/7th (14.3%) of their new town land - that's therefore 85.7% which if it ain't brownfield land, must be greenfield land.



This is for the whole of Arun district too!

Interesting!

Another one bites the dust - Tesco withdraw Hanley Grange

Announced today - Hanley Grange in Cambridgeshire is now off the list of Eco Towns. This was the site proposed by Tescos and universally opposed by local residents. A few weeks ago a partner in the scheme, the Wellcome Trust, withdrew their land from the proposal.

Today Tescos has followed suit and bowed to the local opposition and withdrawn from the Government's shortlist.

Here is a link to the local newspaper - http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/cn_news_home/DisplayArticle.asp?id=343987 - it is interesting to read the quote from Tescos:

"We also believe a genuinely sustainable community stands the best chance of being successful if a broad range of stakeholders in the region feel fully engaged in the process leading up to a decision."

I think we can take that as recognition from Tescos that their involvement in this undemocratic Eco Town process, looking to impose huge developments against the wishes of all concerned, is never going to lead to success. They are reserving the right to bring their proposal back again through local democracy - would that the Ford Eco Town proposers would do the same! But the partners in the Ford Airfield 'Vision' Group have failed trying that so many times that theyknow that local democracy will not allow them to ruin our countryside. I doubt they've got the nerve to risk it!

Petition handover date

On 2 October a delegation from CAFE will be presenting our petition to Downing Street. We have so far got nearly 1,000 signatures on the No 10 Petitions website:

http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/No-Ford-Eco-Town/

And over 10,000 people have signed our paper petition - so if you have would like to sign the petition and have not done so - or perhaps if you have family or friends who support us, but have not signed yet - then now is a good time to get them to do so!

http://www.nofordecotown.co.uk/downloads/cafe_petition.pdf

Financial Times - 'Ministers faced with delays in eco-towns timetable'

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/986dbc84-6d85-11dd-857b-0000779fd18c.html?nclick_check=1

If this link doesn't quite work, do a search on eco towns on the FT site.

What they are saying is that the Government has hidden an announcement that the Eco Town shortlist will now be released until next year in another announcement.

'A shortlist of applicants due to be published in October will not come out until next year, it has emerged. In addition, there is evidence that ministers may be starting to row back from their target of 10 towns....Caroline Flint, housing minister, has recently begun to talk about "up to 10 eco-towns" '

No guarantees that this will hold, but it is interesting to see the weight of this kind of reporting that is now coming out.

Caroline Flint under fire in her own constituency - continued

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article4547602.ece?Submitted=true

So to continue from Mr Gummidge's pre-release mention of the Sunday Times article - here is it!

In the midst of this report on the Rossington - that's in Sheffield, Mrs Flint's own consituency - Eco Town, the following summary of the current bids appears:

"The three leading contenders are Rossington, in Flint’s Don Valley constituency; Whitehill and Bordon in Hampshire, the only scheme that is being led by the local authority; and Marston Vale, in Bedfordshire, which has significantly less local opposition than other proposals.
Other sites still considered as options are Middle Quinton, near Stratford-upon-Avon, and Weston Otmoor, in Oxfordshire. "

Unsurprisingly the Marston Vale protestors are up in arms about the implication that there is not as much opposition there as in other places. From a Ford point of view, it is interesting that The Times are now reporting Ford as one of the least likely to go ahead.

Letters...

Not blind to housing needs
Derek Waller writes: I was disappointed to learn from your report last week, Littlehampton Gazette, August 7, that the wealthy, articulate and powerful housing minister thinks that she has an exclusive right to speak on behalf of the "hidden homeless" in Arun District; what arrogance. Click here for more...

I certainly did view site
Meanwhile the indefatable Housing Minister Caroline Flint must be rattled because she writes: I WAS astonished by the article in your paper suggesting I did not go to the site of the proposed Ford eco-town during my visit last month. Click here for more...

Thanks, CAFE, for being so articulate
Mrs C. A. Cooper writes to thank CAFÉ for all the hard work they have done. Click here for more...

At least she made the effort to visit
And finally more tripe from Tony Dixon: In a district with over 4,000 households on the housing waiting list, the lowest average wage in West Sussex, 40 per cent of the workforce out-commuting every day, a serious infrastructure deficit particularly on the A27 at Arundel, below-average educational attainment etc, we should all be grateful that a government minister found the time, in the parliamentary recess, to visit the district and listen to the views of those on all sides of the eco-town debate. Click for more...

Eco-town plan is the pits, former miners tell minister

Caroline Flint, the housing minister, faces a backlash in her own constituency after it emerged that a former mining community she represents is likely to be selected for one of the first eco-towns.

Whitehall insiders predict that plans for 5,000 new environmentally friendly homes on the site of an old coal mine in the deprived area of Rossington, Doncaster, will get the go-ahead next year. It is one of three eco-towns regarded as likely to be built.

Flint maintains that the developers are not being given preferential treatment and has appointed a junior minister to deal with the proposal to avoid accusations of a conflict of interest. Click for more...

Hang on - this story is published in the Times tomorrow - its Saturday 16th - my news feeds are so fine tuned I'm getting the news before it happens!!!

Ecotown plans are not sustainable

John Anderson, Martin Bradshaw, Stephen Byrne, John Collins and 10 other former presidents of the Royal Town Planning Institute write:

As a development model, the ecotown is to be welcomed. However, as former presidents of the Royal Town Planning Institute, we hold serious reservations about the way in which sites for these developments have been promoted (Germaine Greer, G2, August 11). Some of the proposed ecotowns derive from a clear planning process, but others represent an undermining of planning policy at both regional and local level. Some have simply provided excuses for landowners to reintroduce tired schemes that have already been rejected within a legitimate planning process. It is our view that this approach is wrong. Click for more...

Caroline Flint's super-powers exposed!

What a give-away .... there we all were, thinking that Caroline was just another cabinet minister, when under that mild-mannered and unassuming exterior lies a super-hero with extraordinary visual powers.

In a snappy little riposte to the Littlehampton Gazette's comment in last weeks edition, where it was stated that she had refused a tour of the proposed eco town site, she wrote ...

"I certainly did view the site. When I first arrived in Yapton, I viewed the whole site from the former runway of Ford airfield. This was enormously helpful in my subsequent meetings with developers, local authorities and MPs"

Fantastic!
I could walk for an hour and not see the whole site, while Caroline can stand on the Ford runway and without the need for binoculars or photo-opportunities, survey the entire scene!

A truly remarkable woman, capable of remarkable feats, and I cannot but wonder what other powers she possesses.
Maybe she can shrug off bullets?

I hope so, because she just shot herself in the foot!

Eco-Town doesn't make the shortlist

The terms WAG, HIP and credit crunch have become so widely used in everyday life that they have merited entry in the new version of The Chambers Dictionary. 'Eco-village'- defined as "a small-scale, environmentally friendly settlement designed for sustainable living" - is also included. Interestingly, 'eco-town' is not. Click here for more...