Newtown St.Boswells

In the local papers, we see responses to the proposal by Persimmon to build 500 houses near the dump at Easter Langlee and also to the proposal to build nearly 100 houses at Innerleithen.

The repondents are worried about the scale of those developments. There is a suggestion that 500 new houses at Easter Langlee is just too many and will overwhelm the local infrastructure - schools, roads, health services and so forth.

Again, people in Innerleithen are worried that the proposed development is simply too much for a small town to cope with.

Well, what about Newtown St.Boswells?

Here, we have proposals for a total of well over 1200 new houses to be built in and around a village with, at present, about 500 houses. The proposals, which would more than treble the population, will transform our village into the sixth largest town in the Scottish Borders. Comparable in size with Eyemouth and Jedburgh.

The comparison is unfortunate, as both of those places have been much in the news for street crime, vandalism and yobbishness which prevents most people from going out of doors in the evenings.

So it is understandable that Newtonians are worried about the damaging social change which will result from the proposed over-development.

These proposals, which were brought forward by Scottish Borders Council with no prior consultation, were and remain against the expressed wishes of the people who live here.

Objections to the scale of what has been proposed have been submitted by the village's Community Council, other village groups and many individuals. A petition signed by the majority of Newtonains opposed the Council's plans for a massive 'village expansion'. The Council's response to this tide of opinion was to reject every one of those submissions.

There has been a public inquiry into the Council's Local Plan, however the inquiry remit did not extend to a consideration of whether the houses were needed but the narrow question of where they should be built. The inquiry found in favour of the Council's plan.

So I don't hold out much hope for those people worried about the scale of developments at Easter Langlee and Innerleithen.