IN the midst of our nation’s ongoing financial and housing crises, and the Government’s desperate attempts to build their way out of them, I write to express deep concern about the way in which the new National Planning Framework is being implemented in our area.

As far as I am able to ascertain, there is absolutely nothing now that can actually stop a developer from getting green field site planning permission approved – including the much vaunted ‘Local Plan’, which is supposed to enshrine the democratic wishes of the people living in that area.

Can any of your readers give local examples in the last year where builders’ plans have been changed significantly as a result of local objections? I suspect not. Our inability to adjust developers’ plans to accommodate local wishes is of vital concern to those of us in Harwell village who are threatened now, not only by unbroken building between the village and Didcot, in the shape of ‘Valley Park’, but also by the increased traffic it will bring.

And we now have more applications from developers for new houses in the village itself – this is quite staggering. This is not planning, it’s a freefall into a concrete-covered countryside and I am appalled that our local councillors are not up in arms that the democracy which put them in post is being visibly undermined by a planning framework that is clearly unfit for purpose.

RICHARD LEAMAN, High Street, Harwell