The case for by Derek Benfield, deputy council leader

We will be supporting the structure plan because it has been proved to be the most sustainable area in the town for expansion.

It has also been subject to an Examination in Public (EIP) by independent Government inspectors and the EIP, with a few amendments, still said that the Front Garden is the most sustainable of the options given for expansion.

Who are we to go against the recommendations of the officers and the inspectors?

If we voted against the structure plan it would be open to an appeal by the Goddards Estate, which owns 40 per cent of Front Garden, and it would be entirely within its right to do so.

The area that the estate owns lies closest to the housing in Old Town, and the 50 per cent owned by the council is the lower half. So if a future appeal by Goddards Estate was successful, we would end up with 40 per cent developed and the rest left empty, which would mean that the campaigners would still lose.

Any development there would be low density housing and we would make sure that there is still plenty of open space available, especially around the River Ray.

I honestly believe that a development in the Front Garden could be the jewel in the crown of Swindon, which will be a pleasure for everyone.

Personally I am quite excited about the prospect of creating a development which will benefit the whole of the borough.

At the end of the day we have got to put these houses somewhere as part of a Government directive and there is no real alternative to the Front Garden.

We have looked intensely into all of the alternatives and we feel that the Front Garden is definitely the best option.

Regarding the rural buffer argument, there is no reason why a rural buffer cannot be built into the development as part of the plans.

In a way, the M4 motorway serves as a buffer between Swindon and Wroughton, but if you look at the bottom of Croft Road, there is hardly any distance between the village and the towns.

We have been contacted by the Environment Agency, which has told us that the flood plain would not pose a problem as long as we develop the area properly.

For every acre of the flood plain we take away, we will provide another, giving the development a lot of open space which will not affect the flood plain at all.

All in all, we are only going to be following the advice of EIP and our own officers who have looked into every aspect of the Front Garden.