<div>The Five Parishes’ Group has voiced outrage at the latest action by the Secretary of State to call in the Highsted Park decision just 2 hours and 50 mins ahead of Swale Borough Council’s planning committee.
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<div>This highly unusual, anti democratic, decision by the Secretary of State, Angela Rayner MP means the decision making on this speculative development has been taken out of local hands. The local Labour MP Kevin McKenna had lobbied Rayner to call in this speculative application that he fully supported, against the wishes of the local electorate.
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<div>The proposals are split into 2 applications, they are for a new motorway junction on the M2, in the Kent Downs protected landscape (National Park), 8,400 dwellings on some the UK's best agricultural land, an southern A2/M2 link road through ancient woodland and a northern link road through a park, chalk stream and over a railway line. This speculative scheme has never been in any local plan. The promoters in their lobbying letter to government say this can all be delivered within the lifetime of this parliament which is clearly misleading and plainly unachieveable. We are not alone in our objections, there is a significant group of statutory agencies (including Highways England, Historic England, Kent Downs, Kent County Council etc) strongly opposed to these applications.
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<div>We believe these applications are a serious threat to local and national infrastructure including highways, health, education as well as serious harm to the natural environment including our future food security. The enormity of this decision should not be underestimated as it could set a dangerous precedent for other areas. It should be noted that the Swale area currently has in excess of 7,000 unbuilt planning permissions as well as a whole suite of allocated sites that remain landbanked by developers, clearly an abuse of the system.
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<div>The parishes and its residents are determined to fight these 2 devastating applications and we have been granted Rule 6 status which officially gives us the right to participate in the public inquiry and make your voices heard.
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<div>However in order to do so, we will require your help to support us in funding legal and specialist consultancy representation at the inquiry. As a group of parish councils our funding options are limited and therefore we would very much appreciate any financial support you are able to offer in order to create a "fighting fund".
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<div>Please help us with a donation.
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<div>We are currently identifying specialist consultants who can assist with the inquiry and any donations to our fighting fund will be most gratefully received.
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<div>The Five Parishes group has been in existence for 20 years working to voice the concerns of the community. For more information visit <a href="https://www.fiveparishes.org.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Five Parishes</a>
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