Plans for homes may cost jobs

Nov 5 2007 by Neil Mckay, The Journal

A CIVIC boss has warned that potential new jobs could be lost to housing after the government over-ruled a local decision to refuse plans for 250 houses on a contaminated former factory site.

Durham City Council wanted to encourage the use of the former Cape Asbestos factory at Bowburn, just off the A1M south of Bowburn, for industry.

But government inspectors overturned their decision to refuse permission to Hallam Land Management and Commercial Estates Group to build 250 homes as well as offices and light industrial units at the former factory which closed in 1990. The council argued that the proposals had too much emphasis on housing and not enough on job creation.

Regional development agency One NorthEast, the North-East Assembly and Durham County Council also raised concerns.

But following a four-day public inquiry in July, the Government announced last week that the council’s decision had been overturned by Secretary of State Hazel Blears.

Hallam had argued it could not make a profit from the project without a significant element of housing, which under the proposal would make up about 70% of the site, because it would cost more than £2.3m to clean up the asbestos-contaminated land.

The report by planning inspector Edward Simpson accepted that Hallam’s proposal was in conflict with council polices which designated the site for industrial use, but said there was little prospect of the land being used for industry “in the foreseeable future”.

But Fraser Reynolds, leader of Durham City Council, said: “We fully accept the decision of the Government in relation to this key site but we still have concerns about the substantial level of decontamination that will have to be carried out to make way for housing.

“This has now set precedence and means we will have to look again at our brown field sites to try and minimise the possibility of the district losing its potential for investment and the ability to create more jobs.

“When the City of Durham Council refused planning permission for housing on land that we had allocated as a potential employment site in 2006, the decision was in accordance with all the relevant planning policies and both the County Council and One NorthEast agreed with the decision.”