Epping District Council Ignores Public Opinion and Approves South Epping Development Anyway.
- Mar 20
- 4 min read
As predicted by us just 3 days ago, the Epping District Councils Cabinet at a meeting last night have totally ignored the people of Epping and have approved the building of 'a minimum' of 450 homes on a site in South Epping.
It is difficult to find the words to describe the arrogance and self indulgence of this decision given that the councils own consultation carried out last summer showed a 73% rejection of the current plans by the public.
You have to wonder if the council exists to represent the people of Epping or property developers.
The Consultation which runs at over 300 pages received only a scant mention in the short summary as presented to councillors and is only in the public domain because The Epping Society put in a freedom of information request and despite the consultation taking place last June and July, was only made public a few weeks ago giving all those concerned little opportunity to digest its contents.
We believe that this document, so utterly damning was deliberately withheld due to the overwhelming negativity within those 300 plus pages. We have since received messages from residents whose contributions against the development were not included in the final document.
Epping Town Mayor Cherry McCredie represented The Epping Society and South Epping residents at the meeting and conveyed various objections to the plan including the Councils woeful reporting and consideration of the results of the consultation.
She described that plan as having 'all the makings of a disaster' and urged councillors to spend more time reading the consultation document and have a rethink.
Cherry McCredie noted that the document contained over 100 pages of criticisms and the overall view of residents is an 'empathetic no' to the development. She further noted that these responses were noted in just 5 lines in the cabinet report.
(Editors note: 5 lines... yes you read that correctly. Your opinion is worth just 5 lines to Epping District Council out of 100 pages. Who are they REALLY representing?)
Shaping Our District portfolio holder councillor Ken Williamson said the site was not now in the Green Belt and the principle of development was 'absolutely established'
(Editors note: This statement by Councillor Williamson is chilling. Note that the site is not NOW on the greenbelt indicating a goalpost moved to facilitate. The mention of the principle of development was 'absolutely established'. Really??? Not established to the 3 out of 4 who are firmly against. Mission Creep followed by an aptly metaphorical bulldozer through the wishes of local people seems to be the flavour of the day. Has it been any other way? Just look at the Car Park. More on that later)
Councillor Williamson went on to mention 40% Affordable Housing and Retail Provision.
Well I'm sorry but we have heard all this before. Remember the original local plan with the intention if a cinema, affordable housing and retail units on the old Epping Primary Site. All scaled back. The affordable housing became unaffordable for the developers and scaled back dramatically and The Cinema and the retail units were ditched and and we ended up with a Car Park that would not look out of place in 1970's East Berlin sink estate which....wait for it, does not add a single extra parking space to the town.
Councillor Holly Whitbread did at least make some attempt to get councillors to have a think, however short lived when she commented that this was perhaps not the best site for development and raised concerns of the pressure on local GP services not to mention infrastructure.
Now back to that dreaded car park. The Epping Society raised many concerns prior to the building of the car park, most of which were totally ignored by the Council.
They just ploughed ahead with what anyone with any modicum of intellect could see would be a disaster. It is a magnet for anti social behaviour and boy racers late at night and It is as ugly as sin.
If you are going to spend millions of council tax payers money on a car park, surely it is not beyond the wit of man (or architect) to build something sympathetic to the surroundings and in afraid a patch of fake grass (against council policy) and a table tennis table doesn't quite cut it.
Have you noticed how many local shops have been or are about to close? Shop keepers tell us that they were not consulted and the new car park is ironically reducing foot fall, especially for people who would have stayed in the town for a longer period. This is making some businesses unviable.
So, we are at a point where 450 plus houses are to be built on a water soaked piece of land (yep it has been know to flood) and next to the M25 and in the process also destroy historic flora and fauna that has existed for thousands of years. The town will suffer more congestion, more pollution and probably more illness.
For our part, we will continue to fight for Epping and remind everyone at the next local elections what these particular councillors regardless of political party are foisting on us in a compete rejection of democratic principles.
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My wife and I were at the council meeting last night and we were especially appalled at the smug swipe made by councillor Williamson when addressing the overwhelmingly negative view of those who responded to the consultation process. He seemed to suggest that it was not really indicative of the real views of Epping residents because it was only a majority of ‘those who bothered to respond’. Presumably, he is happy enough to consider himself democratically elected on, from what I have been able establish, a 30% voter turnout. He really can’t have it both ways.