COME TO THE PLANNING MEETING! 10am, on Thursday 9th October in Council Chamber at County Hall, Llandrindod Wells. Car share available! contact nobroadheathbroilers@hotmail Show Powys County Council that you care about the Green Heart of Wales. Intensification is not diversification . Stop the spread of the broiler shed! N W HEREFORDSHIRE HAS THE BIGGEST CONCENTRATION OF BROILER SHEDS IN EUROPE AND MORE ARE COMING, SPREADING INTO SHROPS & POWYS. WE NEED TO STOP THIS DESECRATION OF THE COUNTRYSIDE - UPDATE -- Permission will be refused or granted at this meeting so it is important we let County Councillors on the Planning Committee know how we feel, by our presence in the Chamber. Bring a friend or two or three. Over the past 15 months, in fighting Powys planning application P/2014/0202 for two vast broiler units at Broadheath, Presteigne, No Broadheath Broilers [NBB] has uncovered an amazing amount of information about the way big corporate interests are increasingly dictating the shape of our countryside and the decisions of our public servants. Our natural environment is being steadily destroyed and unless we act now, this is set to continue and escalate. The authorities are increasingly depending on us to do their jobs for them. Please dont hesitate to contact us if you would like contacts and details on how to object . In brief, here is the latest: • The 2014 Annual Report for the Herefordshire branch of the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England [CPRE] highlights the threat to the countryside from the unrestrained development of poultry units . The AGM is 2pm on 18 October at Bodenham village hall and non-members are very welcome to attend .For catering rsvp to [email protected] • Roger Williams MP and Kirsty Williams AM have this month put Parliamentary Questions about campylobacter in chickens, the cumulative environmental impact of the many broiler and poultry units in the area and other issues around allowing any further units to be developed. • The Perfect Storm paper by the Wye and Usk Foundation, sent to Hereford County Council, reports the threat of broiler units and rapidly rising phosphate levels and reduced fish stock and biodiversity in the River Lugg . Pollution is exacerbated by the flooding of recent years and the runoff of 1000’s of tonnes of poultry manure spread on the land. • Roger and Kirsty’s Freedom of Information requests, have revealed that planning permission has been passed in Powys for a staggering 99 Poultry unit applications over 5 years. Only two were refused by the committee and later consented. The one NBB has been fighting in Presteigne for over a year has been refused by caring Councillors and thanks to your support, the battle goes on! Enough is enough. • Since the planning application was submitted in July last year we have seen the Campylobactor and Botulism issues around industrialised poultry production in the news, a decline in the economic viability of units with poultry businesses folding in 2012/13 and massive flooding all over the county, along the Lugg and its tributaries feeding into the vitally important Wye river catchment - just where the proposed broiler units are sited. • Gaping holes have been discovered in the ‘expert’ odour reports and Environmental Statement submitted for P/2014/0202 at Upper Heath, Presteigne and the evidence points to wholesale overlooking of Environmental, Residential, Heritage and Highways issues by the planners . Policy is being overlooked, environmental regulations are being flouted and there is only a skeleton crew in the regulatory departments left to monitor these industrial scale poultry facilities once they are built. • Three Grade II Listed buildings are within 350 metres of the broiler units and the important Broadheath House Historic Garden designed by Clough Williams Ellis [of Portmeirion fame] , a registered open garden to the public with the Open Garden Society is a mere 300m away, against regulations, yet CADW has nothing to say on the matter. • No Traffic Impact Assessment has been asked for by Powys Planners, yet for any other major development this would normally be a strict requirement. Instead, the applicant has conducted a one day traffic survey….in the wrong place. • We have discovered academic reports about the serious damage to workers’ health inside intensive poultry units and to residents living around broiler units. Despite cleaning procedures, inevitably ventilators quickly clog with the fine hazardous poultry dust that covers the local area and penetrates the ground through rainfall . Further health hazards are caused by the necessary continuous spreading of tonnes of litter, carcass remnants and manure. • We have evidence that units on the ground are frequently being built far bigger than allowed on the planning permission. And nothing is being done. Once up, the typical pattern is to extend and extend again, getting as many massive sheds up as possible in the shortest space of time. And it’s far harder for the Planners to stop them once the precedent has been set on a site. • Our story is one of several unfolding in the region. Several other local broiler campaigns and affected individuals have contacted NBB about their plight and a local planning consultancy is so angry about the damage to the Herefordshire and Powys countryside and residential amenity, they have set up a website, BroilingMad. broilingmad.co.uk/broiler-units-are-not-sustainable-the-facts/ • FOI requests have been sent to Welsh Government and Powys County Council asking about suspected Section 106 agreements [Planning Gain] and incentives , and relationships to developers and other big agri-business interests that may be influencing interpretation of planning policy and swaying decision making. Why are the planners approving these units without question? Even when elected Councillors are objecting on firm planning grounds? Who stands to gain? • We want to know about the relationship between the Environment Agency in England and Natural Resources Wales. NRW has a clear foundation mandate to communicate with EA and any other regulatory bodies, including other Local Authorities when a planning application is made within 10km of the Wye-Usk catchment, But this mandate is being silently ignored along the Welsh Marches. Why? • Levels of Phosphate and other pollutants from poultry units and heavy manuring along the River Lugg [SSSi ] have been soaring in the river system over recent years , due to the many poultry units being allowed along the catchment. This could put a spanner in the works for Poultry unit development upstream, if true consultation were ever followed through. • Communication has been appalling between Powys County Council, Natural Resources Wales and the public with many official complaints being made. The PCC Public Planning portal website conveniently and repeatedly breaks down just before key dates. PCC has even removed the end consultation date from the site so the public do not realize they can still object. Planners at PCC have repeatedly withheld important information from the public and repeatedly delayed passing vital new information to statutory consultees. • The only open line of communication all the way along has been between the agent for the developer and the Powys Planning officers. THE FIGHT GOES ON!
Posted on: Thu, 02 Oct 2014 08:31:58 +0000
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