Highthorn planning permission refused

Banks Mining slam Secretary of State’s ‘perverse’ Highthorn public inquiry decision

IGNORING the recommendation of the Planning Inspector that Banks Mining’s proposed Highthorn surface mine in Northumberland should be allowed to go ahead, Sajid Javid, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, has today refused to grant planning permission for the site on the grounds that the harm to the local landscape, together with the impact on global warming, would outweigh the economic benefits of the mine.

Responding to Mr Javid’s decision, Gavin Styles, managing director of Banks Mining, said: ‘In the same week that the Government decided to support passport manufacturing jobs in France instead of those in north-east England, it has now demonstrated that it would prefer to source the coal that is essential for a variety of important industries across the UK, such as steel, house building and concrete production, from Russia or the US, rather than support substantial investment and job creation plans in our region.

According to Banks Mining, the Highthorn scheme would create at least 100 full-time jobs at the site, see investment of £87 million into the Northumberland economy, keep a total of £200 million within the UK economy by not importing 3 million tonnes of coal from overseas suppliers, and make supply chain contracts worth a total of £48 million available to locally based businesses.

‘This is an absolutely perverse decision which flies in the face of the recommendation for approval given by Mr Woolcock, the Planning Inspector – the expert appointed by the Government itself to assess this scheme – after his careful consideration of all the facts laid out at the public inquiry, as well as the unanimous support we had for the scheme from an experienced, cross-party Northumberland County Council planning committee,’ said Mr Styles.

‘It has been made for purely political reasons and is totally contrary to the principles of local decision-making that previously appeared so important to Mr Javid. The Planning Inspector’s clear and carefully considered judgement was that ‘the national benefits of the proposal would clearly outweigh the likely adverse impacts', yet Mr Javid has chosen to flagrantly disregard this expert opinion from the comfort of his London office without ever having taken the time to even visit the area in question.

‘Furthermore, his decision to notify the world of his judgement via social media 90 minutes before we, as the applicant, had received official notification of it is deeply unprofessional and shows an utter disregard for the jobs of the hundreds of people that we employ.

‘If the Prime Minister takes up the invitation of the De Le Rue chief executive to come to the region and explain the passport contract decision to his employees, we would ask that she also brings Mr Javid with her, so he can explain his thinking to our loyal north-east workforce and the many local suppliers and customers with which we work.’

According to Mr Styles, the decision to refuse planning permission also continues to highlight the difficulties businesses face creating investment opportunities and employment in the UK, as recently expressed by Steve Morgan, chairman of Redrow plc.

‘We owe it to our highly-skilled and loyal north-east workforce, our UK customers and the many local residents, community organizations and businesses that have expressed their support for our Highthorn proposals over the last four years to not just leave things here, and will now carefully review the precise reasons for the Secretary of State’s decision before deciding on the most appropriate next steps to take.’