Last news roundup of the summer

(I know that in some quarters “Summer” is defined as the months of July, August and September, but to me, the school “rentrée” signifies its end.)

Andrew Tyrie is a NIMBY

 As member of Parliament for the constituency of Chichester, which covers much of West Sussex including Fernhurst, Andrew Tyrie was “unavailable for comment” when asked this week by the Haslemere Herald for his reaction to the protests being launched by the residents of Fernhurst against the fracking licence application being submitted by Celtique Energie.

Unavailable for comment?  Isn’t this a matter of great concern to his constituents?  Should he not have something to say to the local newspaper which no doubt many of those constituents in the Fernhurst area will read?

Well, the Herald article does report that Mr Tyrie supports fracking – but not in his back yard.

 

 

(FFF, by the way, stands for Frack-Free Fernhurst).  I do hope that the Mr Marcus Adams quoted above doesn’t share Mr Tyrie’s view – that fracking is fine for northerners or poor people, just don’t spoil my countryside with it.

However I would agree that the government has no mandate to support fracking – just like it has no mandate for dropping bombs on Damascus, and look where that policy got them!

The Fernhurst Frackers are also the subject of this week’s featured letter in the Herald.  Mr Hingston, a Haslemere resident, evidently deplores the “orchestrated mob” which descended on Balcombe and hopes that no such thing happens at Fernhurst. 

I don’t share his view – the protestors at Balcombe certainly did not observe all aspects of the law, but nor were they violent, intimidating or abusive, and the police response was heavy-handed, to say the least, with at least one member of parliament arrested for simply sitting on the ground.  The correspondent whose letter features immediately next to Mr Hingston evidently agrees with me there.

 

Fernhurst will need all the help it can get.  Best would of course be that they get it from their nearer neighbours, who will no doubt also be adversely affected, as FFF’s demo run with a 32 tonne lorry through Camelsdale and Liphook,  reported on the Herald’s front page, was aimed at showing, but “any port in a storm” so they say.

 

The proposals to seek planning permission to build about 150 houses on land at Sturt Farm, as reported last week, have provoked the predictable reaction, from a resident of a nearby street.

 

 

Everyone?  Speak for yourself, Mr Toms! I can certainly see that residents of Sun Brow, accustomed to looking out over fields from their back windows, would be adversely affected, and they are entitled to object on that basis. And they have my sympathy, but nobody owns a view in this country – unless you also own the land which makes up your view or which stands between you and your view.  Many people who have bought seaside properties have learned this to their cost over the years.  Any loss of agricultural land, whether AONB or however designated, or not, is a pity but, does Mr Toms have children?  I do, and I fear for them – where will they live when they grow up, and how on earth will they ever afford to buy a home somewhere near (not too near, you understand, but not too far either) their parents?  Shortage of supply, exacerbated by pitifully low levels of new building, have driven prices up beyond affordability for anyone other than investment bankers or their children.  Is not Sturt Farm a better option than the old Syngenta site at Fernhurst, which is truly in the middle of nowhere and will certainly impose huge burdens on local schools, roads, parking around the station in Haslemere, etc?  At least Sturt Farm permits residents easy access on foot to teh station or town centre, via the footpath linking them to Longdene Road.

I would also take issue with his hyperbole.  The houses are not being “crammed”.  True, many east-siders are used to having upwards of an acre of garden all to themselves, but the density proposed here, of 150 houses in 33 acres or slightly below 5 per acre, is relatively low density by modern standards, and not significantly denser than the housing in Camelsdale or Critchmere.  There are not going to be “hundreds” of them, and they certainly will not have “thousands” of residents – unless perhaps Mr Toms envisages each house accommodating a football team.

Godalming College appears to have had its planning application, to build housing on its old playing fields and replace those playing fields with new ones on land provided by Ladywell Convent, rejected by Waverley Borough Council.  This matters to us, because that is where the great majority of Haslemere’s sixteen year olds will go to school for their A levels or vocational qualifications – even many of those who attended independent schools up to GCSE.  In addition to the new playing fields, the development would have released money to fund a new teaching block at the school.

I am not qualified to judge the validity of the reasons given by Waverley planners (who certainly have a fearsome reputation for being “The man who likes to say NO”) but surely it is barking mad to suggest, as the Herald reports Godalming Town Council as saying in their objection

Excuse me?  I know this is not quite as extreme as Dunsfold Park, or Syngenta at Fernhurst, but the Milford Hospital site is far more remote from amenities such as schools and shops, is only served by a stopping service on SW from Milford Station and unquestionably requires constant private car use to make it viable.  Those cars will likely also hammer up and down Tuesley Lane, a single-track road which goes into the back of Godalming – not a million miles from the College!

Why oh why did Waverley give consent for the Milford Hospital development if it will not for Godalming College?

And finally, no reports of moaning by our retailers this week about hard done by they are over customers being asked to be something south of a quid – probably less than their petrol bill for their trip – to park in the town, but as further “uplifting” evidence that not all commerce in the town is in the doldrums, this article from page 93 of this week’s Herald.