Highland Council blocks building of new homes

I wasn’t surprised to read the Lochaber Times front page (Thursday July 19), stating that there is housing shortage in Lochaber.

Some 18 months ago, I purchased an area of land opposite Spean Bridge Primary School which was on the local development plan for housing.

It took me more than 12 months to obtain planning permission and even now there are still certain conditions that I’m trying to address. It is absolute nonsense.

To say the whole episode has been a nightmare would be an understatement.

One would think that if you are purchasing land which has been designated for housing, there should not be many problems. I was wrong.

After spending tens of thousands of pounds in the planning process, I had to do many tree surveys at a significant cost.

The Highland Council’s tree, woodland and forestry division did its utmost to try to stop the development, which consisted of nine houses, including affordable homes. The reason was that it would harm trees.

This is where a bit of common sense should prevail. The trees which were young and were known as scrub consisted mainly of willow and young birch and were spread over some parts of the site.

In truth, the trees were never going to amount to anything so, bearing in mind this area of land was designated for housing, why on earth would this man waste taxpayers’ money in trying to stop a housing project which everyone is crying out for?

Lochaber needs change and a little bit of common sense needs to prevail.

In my opinion, instead of encouraging builders to build we are looking for ways and reasons to stop them.

It is crazy and, with the Liberty aluminium factory due to open, among other businesses, we need more houses to cope with the demand.

If we don’t start building and releasing new houses, companies with their projects will go elsewhere.

Ross MacGregor, Achnabobane Farm.