A PROPOSAL to build a new mixed-use building for residential and commercial purposes near the Aldermaston Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) has been rejected.

A development control committee of Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council that met on Wednesday, April 10, refused the application upon recommendation by the planning officers.

They said the site is situated within the detailed emergency planning zone (DEPZ) surrounding the Aldermaston AWE and as a result, it would have a 'detrimental impact on the off-site emergency planning arrangement'.

The officers also said there is insufficient information on the associated business unit at ground floor level.

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Commenting on the recommendation to refuse, Cllr Ken Rhatigan, who represents Tadley North, Kingsclere and Baughurst ward, said the proposal is only a modest addition to the area.

“The reality is Tadley or Baughurst don’t have a surplus of businesses,” he said.

“I think our role as the planning committee is to help organically grow places like Tadley which have by and large not had any large-scale developments.”

He also said another application for a two-bedroom house near this site was recently approved following a planning appeal.

“That appeal decision in my view determines that this is a modest increase.”

However, following a clarification by the planning officers on the reasons for refusal, Cllr Rhatigan withdrew his plan to move for approval of the application.

Cllr Nick Robinson said: “We have absolutely no idea or control of what’s going to be the business there, what noise it would generate, and what health risk it would generate. With no control or knowledge over it, there is just no way on earth we can pass this.”

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Cllr Angie Freeman also said the council can’t permit piecemeal development which would see the population increasing slowly. 

“It’s like the phrase ‘the straw that broke the camel's back’. You can keep adding just one house. But how many more ‘just one house’ will compromise the safety of the people in the vicinity?

“The people who do the emergency planning are telling us ‘no you can’t put this building here, because it’s going to be too much strain on the system’. I think we have to listen to them.”