Councillor '˜appalled that town has been dumped on again'

There has been an angry reaction to the go-ahead for a concrete plant to be built at Newhaven, and it's not the Brett Aggregates application.

East Sussex County Council last week decided to ‘approve in principal’ an application from F M Conway Ltd to install and operate an Asphalt plant, concrete batching plant and gully waste plant, together with ancillary development on North Quay Road, Newhaven.

Full planning permission will be granted subject to a legal agreement which is expected to be completed in due course.

Hundreds of residents had written to object to the plans.

They argued the concrete plant would cause problems with air quality, worsen road congestion and will cause chaos with the addition of 80 more swing bridge openings per year.

Darren Grover, Lib Dem County Councillor for Newhaven, Denton, South Heighton and Bishopstone, said: “Lib Dem campaigners in Newhaven have led the fight against this proposal since we first heard of it last year.”

He continued: “At this week’s East Sussex County Council Planning Committee meeting, I spoke and voted against the proposals, because I have very serious concerns about how it will impact on our already congested roads, the impact on our air quality, and that it simply does not fit in with the Enterprise Zone’s promise of Clean, Green and Marine developments.”

F M Conway, based in Sevenoaks, Kent, will employ 60 people to operate the plant, and will be responsible for more than 45,000 HGV lorry movements travelling to and from the plant 24 hours per day each year.