Nigel will today present a petition to the House of Commons signed by over 1000 residents of the Ribble Valley stating their opposition to the building of excessive numbers of houses in the area.
The petition declares that; ‘The small rural towns and villages like Longridge, Clitheroe and Whalley up and down the country are under siege from housing developers seeking to build excessive numbers of homes to encourage people to migrate from industrial towns and cities to rural communities.’
Speaking from Westminster this afternoon Mr Evans said, “I have long argued against the current situation surrounding large scale housing developments in the Ribble Valley and I am pleased to be able to demonstrate in Parliament the scale of local opposition, which has left communities feeling swamped by housing applications.
This is not a petition designed to stop any more houses being built at all, but it is an attempt to demonstrate that the people of the Ribble Valley feel powerless in their fight against developers.
I do not believe that the Government intended to arrive at a situation where local authorities would feel unable to say no to developers without a Core Strategy in place but that is where we are, and I am supportive of the proposal in the petition to suspend the presumption of approval for applications until 90% of local authorities have an approved local development plan.”