In their front-page article in this Sunday's, Kent on Sunday, Kent County Council leader Paul Carter is quoted as being ''very disappointed'' by the news of imperial colleges abandonment of their plans to build a science park around Wye which is an area of outstanding natural beauty.
Now to be fair to Paul Carter, perhaps his disappointment is that it has taken so long for Imperial College to see sense, and terminate the outrageous plans, they had to build what in effect would have been a new town, on the rather thin excuse of being part of the science park.
Further on in the article by James McGinnes, Paul Carter again is quoted ''the opportunity to create really significant employment growth and prosperity has now disappeared it is very disappointing news'' , now I maybe unfair to Paul Carter, in none of the statements quoted from him, in this article is there any reference, to the harm that would have been done to a beautiful part of Kent.
Even Imperial College seemed to acknowledge the gravity of the situation, with some honesty when Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, Imperial's deputy Rector said ''Having carefully considered all the issues involved, the project team has concluded none of the scenarios for the vision would represent a wise, viable or desirable investment of public funds for Imperial College and Wye.''
Those of us who live, in Thanet may just feel that this has nothing to do with us, but as Paul Carter is the leader of Kent County Council, right or wrong his opinions and attitude matter to us. Thanet I believe has suffered because quite literally we are at the end of the road from Maidstone, and has for many years had a complacent traditional Tory administration which I feel has ignored us for too long.
The fact that Mr Carter, in regard to Wye, seems concerned more about the economic impact of Imperial Colleges decision rather than the utter devastation to any area of outstanding beauty, is to me astounding, Wye is located between Canterbury and Ashford which traditionally are both prosperous towns with good employment figures.
If Paul Carter were so concerned about Kents economy, perhaps he could concentrate his mind on the plight of Thanet and other less prosperous areas, here is one suggestion maybe they could close all the Kent administrative apparatus they have in Maidstone and move it to Manston.
Click here for links to my previous thoughts on Wye.
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