As one of the present Kennet district councillors for Devizes, can I say how much I agree with the facts listed in Mr Clayton's letter in the Gazette last week.

The appeal hearing last week over Kennet's refusal of planning permission for houses on the Kverneland factory site on Folly Road could exacerbate the situation, if it succeeds.

However, the apportionment of blame which Mr Clayton suggests, does need to be qualified somewhat.

Kennet was to blame (some years ago) in its allocation of so many new houses to Devizes and in letting Marlborough and Pewsey off so lightly. This was before my time, but when similar choices arise now, it is easy for Devizes councillors to be outvoted by the Conservative lead group majority, who typically represent other parts of Kennet.

We are where we are, and Mr Clayton's blame should now be directed at other targets, in Trowbridge and Westminster. Until recently, the Wiltshire highway authority refused to contemplate any consideration at all of Devizes traffic problems, while at the same time signing off each housing allocation as acceptable in traffic terms. My suspicion is that Wiltshire County Council analysed each allocation independently of the cumulative effect of each of the others.

Extreme pressure from Devizes district councillors, with support from Devizes county councillors, has eventually persuaded Wiltshire to promise a remodelling of housing traffic impacts on Devizes, but only if the developers pay up front. Some concession! And meanwhile, the one absentee at the recent Quakers Walk consultation at the Corn Exchange was from Wiltshire Highways.

Meanwhile, regional planners are under pressure from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister to meet ever more extreme targets for housing allocations. Devizes district councillors will try to see that in future these are shared more evenly around Kennet.

The latest bombshell is a new planning guideline from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, which says that planning permission should be favoured when developers are seeking to convert brownfield sites to housing, even in contradiction of the Local Plan, unless the local authority can prove that employment is economically viable. This proof is an impractical hoop to jump through, and it means that Kverneland will have a good chance of succeeding, even if the Local Plan gets torn up in the process.

The one glimmer of positive news, is that an equivalent area of greenfield housing allocation may be deleted in exchange. This has yet to be tested, but it could include Quakers Walk!

J Ody

Devizes Guardians

Kennet District Council