Garden so brown

I NOTICE that another garden-grabbing planning application has been passed by Arun District Council for three detached houses with garages on the garden and land of 18 Mill Lane, Toddington, situated on the very dangerous corner with Toddington Lane.

This is just another instance of garden grabbing, whereby builders offer the householder an inflated price for their properties, then apply for planning permission to build on the gardens, or more often knock down the existing properties completely and build smaller houses or flats.

This increases population density and, campaigners say, damages the character of an area.

We have seen this time and time again with the loss of many family houses in Littlehampton and Rustington, replaced with either retirement apartments or one-bedroom flats.

The Conservatives said the problem had arisen because of changes to planning policy drawn up by former Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott in 2000, classifying gardens as brownfield, rather than greenfield, land.

Well it’s about time this new government put a stop to garden grabbing, otherwise we will have no gardens left for our future generations to enjoy, just more concrete and one-bedroom flats!

S. Mullineux

Old Manor Road

Rustington