Is the Rolls-Royce jobs scheme just a cynical ploy?
WITH regard to recent Dispatch front-page story, entitled ‘Just The Job’, and the plan to create 800 jobs at the Rolls-Royce site in Hucknall.
Is this a clinical ploy to release land for a housing development?
How much vacant industrial space is there in and around Hucknall? After a brief look on the Internet, I found more than 13 empty units, including one of 29,000 sq ft, off Watnall Road.
So do we need more factory units to remain empty so that large companies can offset their taxes, while yet another housing estate destroys more green and pleasant land?
This development will bring us closer to Bulwell, thus stripping Hucknall of its identity and independence.
How much disused/rundown land and how many buildings are there around Hucknall that could be returned to good use?
If all the boarded-up houses were given to housing associations, complete with loans to return the houses/flats to their former glory, how many homes would that create?
As for creating more jobs with new factories, companies often move into new factories for better rent and rate deals, leaving behind an old unit which becomes derelict, creating no new jobs in the process. There are examples around Hucknall of this happening in the past.
Or is all the above just silly old me thinking it`s all about big business, not the community? I would love to see more jobs created. We all know they are sorely needed. But nothing seems to change, does it?
Last week’s Dispatch also revealed that we live in an area with more children living below the poverty line than the national average and that, 71 years ago, women stood in the snow for hours trying to get food.
Not to worry. There cannot be much wrong with our country when the bankers still get millions while, at the same time, children do not get enough to eat.
JOHN PINFOLD,
Washdyke Lane, Hucknall.
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Thursday 24 May 2012
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kylejamie
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 02:51 PMFirstly let me introduce myself, my name is Kyle Heesom, 22 years old and I'm currently a foundation degree student at Nottingham Trent University studying environmental conservation and countryside management. So as a Bulwell lad all my life, Bulwell Hall park has been been a place of great importance to me, to have such a beautiful area full of wildlife and beauty is something that all us Bulwellians are lucky to have so close to us. Growing up, I have realised Bulwell has had its fair share of negative publicity, and outside of Bulwell alot of people I have noticed do not have a good view of Bulwell. But it is Bulwell Hall Park that makes our town unique to the majority of Nottingham's urban towns. It is every Bulwellian's back garden, which has supplied us all with great memories like it has done for myself! But just like what you are referring to JOHN PINFOLD that there is a proposal to develop a new factory and employment units that would go hand-in-hand with 800 new homes on another part of the Rolls Royce site off Watnall Road- my concern is that if this happens this would be devastating for the for the wildlife and the people who use Bulwell Hall Park! it would create an eyesore for us, ruining the beauty that the park and surrounding area has to offer but more importantly in my eyes it would have an devastating effect on the wildlife. Majority of people don't realise it but the area in question is an habitat of wildlife significance, and birds that are currently under threat which are not common have been spotted in this area, more notably the severe-decreasing skylark which have a red status so as a red listed species they have conservation priorities! Other species include the short eared owl, barn owl, curlew and golden plovers which are amber listed so they are of some concern too due to declines in the last 25 years. Muntjac Deers have also been spotted on the old rolls royce site, so it isn't just birds. What also frustrates me is that this proposal is being backed by Coun Mick Murphy, a Hucknall Conservative member of Notts County Council, the town’s Tory MP, Mark Spencer and Coun Chris Baron (Lab), a Hucknall member of Ashfield District Council. They explain how beneficial it would be to Hucknall's economy and people, but this land is just as much as Bulwell than it is Hucknall, if not more! How narrow minded are they, without even considering the view of the Bulwell people and how it would effect us. I understand that it would create jobs and how beneficial that would be, but its ruining the one thing that makes Bulwell so different to alot of Nottingham's urban towns, and that's our park : OUR beautiful back garden! The Proposed plan would be built from the bypass to the edge of BULWELL WOODLAND, fragmenting habitats and preventing wildlife from passing from one habitat to another and creating an eyesore so close to a beautiful place. What you have got to realise is that Bulwell Hall Park isn't just one piece of land but it is apart of a vast array of countryside which leads up to Blenheim lane and then carries on up into Snape Woods and then into Trowell and so forth, so the wildlife can pass one area to another- but the go-ahead of such a plan would prevent this. Habitat destruction is wildlife's biggest threat, and we must not bring this to Bulwell Hall Park and it's surrounding area! I am aware that this proposal may not even get the go-ahead, but I'd thought I would raise the awareness of this subject before it's too late. Dispatch, I don't know what you're view is, but I'm asking for your help or to at least publicize this awareness in your newspaper! I Know the dispatch is a good fair newspaper, so I hope you understand mine and many other's concerns that we don't want our back garden being destroyed or at least being reduced to just a fragamented 'park': it's more than a park.. its every Bulwellian's back garden that has its fair share of rare wildlife! I hope others agree!! Also, as a young proud Bulwellian, I also want to represent the young people of Bulwell in a good light. Fighting for what I believe in and proving not every young person in Bulwell is pushing a pram with no life aspirations! Thanks for reading! :)
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