How our countryside is vanishing under bricks

He was speaking after a report published by the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE) warned that England's countryside could vanish within a generation unless current trends such as increased development are reversed.

The report, called Your Countryside, Your Choice examines the main influences on the countryside and their long-term effects. The CPRE identifies several long term threats including expanded house building programmes, expansion of road freight distribution, car-dependent development and major airport expansion. These, together with a dramatic decline in farming, polarised land management, water shortages and climate change are seriously damaging our countryside.

"We are very concerned about the levels of housebuilding that central government is trying to impose on the South East. West Sussex is a key part of the South East and we share a lot of those concerns," said Cllr Smith.

"The levels of housebuilding in particular haven't been well thought out and figures haven't been arrived at by a scientific formula of need. Of course there needs to be some new housing such as affordable housing for key workers and for people who have grown up in West Sussex so they can continue living and working here. But the levels that the government is trying to impose on West Sussex could be seriously environmentally damaging and we could lose a lot of our precious countryside if this continues."

Full story in West Sussex Gazette, September 15