Braintree District Council votes to oppose planning application and to support a public inquiry
Braintree District Council's Planning Committee (last night, 25th November) voted to oppose the planning application for a regional waste site and incinerator on Rivenhall Airfield and also voted to call for a public inquiry.Councillors also agreed to a series of seven ammendments to the officers recommendations to object. Many of these ammendments were initially recommended by Witham Local Committee last week (18th November).
Braintree District Council's (BDC) agreed position is now one of strong opposition to the waste site plans, raising detailed concerns about planning policy breaches and the environmental impacts of the proposed 60 acre waste site in the countryside which would operate 24/7. (Please note: BDC is a consulteee to the application - the determining authority is Essex County Council).
One of the successful ammendments identified the fact that the proposed 360,000 tonne per annum "Combined Heat and Power Plant" (the developer's description) is actually a waste incineration facility. The consultants that BDC is employing to help advise on the application, ERM, agreed with this description at the meeting. In a letter to a local District Councillor, the Environment Agency also referred to the waste burning plant in terms of waste incineration/an incinerator no less than 7 times. It appears now that the only parties not correctly describing the plant as a waste incinerator are the applicants, (Gent Fairhead), and Essex County Council.
Members of the Planning Committee from all parties strongly supported the call for a public planning inquiry, and some referred to the conflict of interest that the County Council appears to have in being all at the same time the waste planning authority, waste disposal authority, waste planning policy authority and waste infrastructure procurement authority in Essex. As far as the Stop the Incinerator Campaign is aware, Rivenhall Airfield remains the only site over which the County Council have discussed a waste incinerator being sited with the owners - discussions which have spanned several years.
It is not yet known when the County Council will consider the application at committee, although it looks as if it may be possibly in the Spring of 2009. The Stop the Incinerator Campaign will be launching the next phase of its campaign soon, to make Essex County Councillors fully aware of the strength of feeling about the plans across the local communities.
The Stop the Incinerator campaign is a non-political cross-community campaign to oppose the regional waste site and incinerator proposed for Rivenhall Airfield, which is a site in open countryside with villages around it. These include Rivenhall, Silver End, Cressing, Bradwell, Coggeshall, Feering and Kelvedon. Witham could also be affected.
For further information, including the full 4 page briefing note on the application, please contact
James Abbott
01376 584576
07951 923073
Visit www.bugleonline.co.uk
and www.ukwin.org.uk
