Cllrs defend their actions
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Wednesday March 10 2010
A NUMBER of councillors have defended their right to act on behalf of individual families that have fallen foul of the council's rural housing policy and been refused permission to build in the area where they grew up.
In response to the advice from county management that inserting individual proposals for one-off housing into the new development plan was not a wise course of action, councillors explained why they were doing it.
Cllr Ken Farrell (Lab), said: 'A large chunk of my area is rural and nobody would fight to protect it more than me but an injustice was done to people who qualified under the old rural housing policy that were then refused under the new policy.'
Cllr David O'Connor (NP) said that the numbers of people applying for rural housing would be even greater if rural councillors like himself did not take time to explain the policy to people and the issues around one-off housing.
Cllr Anne Devitt (FG) said the number of people seeking to build in rural areas was relatively small and that council officials had reacted in an 'over the top' manner to the issue.
- John MANNING
