Close of Examination

20th April 2020

During the Planning Inspectorate’s 6 month examination we submitted 10 documents, totalling over 260 pages and 64,000 words. You can find all these documents on our Planning Inspectorate Examination page. We also attended five hearings and an accompanied site inspection. Details of those hearings and links to the recordings are also available on the same page.

Now that the examination is over, the Planning Inspectorate have 3 months from 9th April 2020 to write a recommendation to the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (currently Alok Sharma). The Secretary of state will then have 3 months to decide whether the Development Consent Order (DCO) should be granted so that the project can go ahead. This means we will know whether the project will proceed on or before 9th October 2020.

Sadly Esso made no major changes to their plans for the park during the Examination so it is still under threat if the Secretary of State approves the DCO.

Although the Examination is complete we still have plans which we hope will reach a more favourable outcome. We are still hopeful that Esso will agree to drill beneath the park, instead of trenching through it and causing major damage to many of the Notable and Veteran Trees within it.

Please keep checking this site, Twitter and the Facebook group for updates.