Editor's Blog: KIGTORY!

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It was the news we had waited three long years to hear. The KIG is dead. And there’s no chance of adding ‘long live the KIG’. We have known for a week that the decision would be announced right on our deadline for this Friday’s KM. What we didn’t know was precisely when it would be revealed and how. Most importantly, we didn’t know what the final verdict was. Then this week the rumour mill was in full flow. It quickly became apparent that it was likely to be good news but initially it was suggested that the planning inspector who sat through the 11-week planning inquiry had actually backed the rail-freight depot plan but that his recommendation had been rejected by the government – in the form of junior minister Bob Neill.  Then we were told that  Hugh Robertson would be announcing the decision first thing on Thursday but when we spoke to the MP he said ‘that’s news to me’. What he was able to indicate was that the inspector Mr Phillipson had actually rejected the proposal himself on planning grounds. And as it turned out  it wasn’t Mr Neill who endorsed the recommendation, it was Julian Pitt, rubberstamped by communities secretary Eric Pickles. Well, we got there in the end and the final result is contained within seven pages of comprehensive coverage in this week’s KM, which has been praised by campaigners for fighting the plan from day one. Now looming on the horizon (or just a few miles down the M20 corridor) comes the next battle, against the Kent Rail and Freight Terminal at Borough Green. After KIG comes KRAFT.

Here’s a excerpt from our editorial comment in this week’s paper:

It was bruising, intensely worrying, galvanising and exhausting... but after three long years battling to block the hated Kent International Gateway we can breathe a gigantic sigh of relief.

And give ourselves an almighty pat on the back because of the achievement in blocking a plan that would effectively have finished any hope we have of protecting our rural heritage and the lives enjoyed by those communities.

In the end it was the loud voice of ordinary people who really drove this campaign, which we are sure held sway in the end.  

They deserve the plaudits. This wasn’t a campaign of simple vitriol and nimbyism. It was expertly run, based on planning issues and need for such a facility.

It’s a decision that should gladden the hearts of anyone who values our countryside and our rural life. We know we can’t preserve everything in aspic, that everyone has to change and that we all have a responsibility to understand and appreciate that the goods we buy have to move around our cramped island in a more efficient way.

But KIG wasn’t the answer.

Thursday, August 05 2010

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