Rights snatch is 'wrong'

BACMI has slammed Government plans to remove mineral planning rights without compensation as 'totally without precedent and fundamentally wrong'. No other industry is being attacked in this way, it says.

BACMI was responding to the Government's consultation on the future of potential quarries which were granted planning permission for mineral extraction years ago.

Despite accepting the need for operators to review their old quarry planning permissions, the aggregates trade group has presented the DoE with several serious criticisms of its proposals.

BACMI believes the proposals attack dormant sites, on which no compensation would be payable. This would mean many sites being penalised for being temporarily inactive because of recession.

The DoE also proposes to reduce the expiry date of pre-1982 permissions to 30 years, which BACMI believes would hit the long-term planning of sites and leave workable minerals in the ground.

The Council for the Protection of Rural England, on the other hand, claims that the proposals have not gone far enough to protect the countryside.