Our future is at stake

'Pendle's tourism website has had a major redesign to attract more visitors to our area' said Councillor Eileen Answar, Pendle's leader for tourism.
The RoughThe Rough
The Rough

Her message on page 2 of Leader Times dated 14th October stressed how lucky we were to live in such a beautiful area where tourism brought in £106 million last year.

Surely it is vital that this aspect of the real world must be resolutely nurtured.

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On the letters’ page, Mark Chung of Burnley and Pendle Ramblers rightly welcomed and justified the decision of Planning Inspector Mike Robins, at the recent appeal hearing, to reject the outline Planning application for 270 houses on all but a small part of “the Rough” on the East side of Colne.

That small site has always been vulnerable for a technical reason. Mr Robins also gave convincing reasons why it was totally inappropriate to go ahead with the 270 scheme.

In addition, the Council has spent significant amounts of council tax payers’ money to fight this housing project, ably supported by action group charity Lidgett and Beyond. At the planning appeal, our MP Andrew Stephenson took the most unusual step of giving a cast iron raft of reasons why building on the Rough was totally inappropriate in spite of 2011 planning legislation making it far too easy for opportunist developers to jump in.

In a nutshell, that legislation has totally failed to recognise that the real situation and needs in Pendle are light years away from the clumsy London and South East model.

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Land allocation is going on in Pendle Council right now. It must not be allowed to undermine what decades of nurturing have achieved. Don’t be afraid to talk to your local Councillors right now. It is our future that is at stake. It is our beautiful countryside which could be destroyed for all the wrong reasons

Owen Oliver. by email.