logoSave our Selsey

Campaign for Coastal Defence

SOS – Selsey Life June 2011


As reported last month, we’ve just got our coast defences up to scratch, so our major concern is now to keep them going. Without maintenance, we will very soon be back to where we started from!
 
That’s making us focus on some related issues: funding, the cost of works, and ensuring that new regulations don’t interfere with our legitimate right to keep on defending our town from erosion (so long as it suits the people who live here, of course - and if we can raise those funds). 
 
Regarding funding, a big change is on the cards. The old system – where you got the full costs of doing coast defence works from the government, or nothing – is on its way out (possibly in the next month or so). The proposed new system means you’ll get a proportion of the cost from government, but – deep intake of breath - the rest has to come from local sources.
 
It’s not clear what those “sources” will be – but now, more than ever, it’s in our interests to keep the costs of maintaining our defences as low as possible. “Every little counts”, as the advert goes! The cheaper it is to maintain them, the more likely we’ll be able to cobble together the money to keep them going – thereby avoiding the need to replace them.
 
Hence our call in last month’s issue to make sure that expanding environmental regulation does not prevent coast defence activities (like shingle replenishment & recycling), or tie them up in red tape so that they become unaffordable.
 
Selsey folk have lived in harmony with their environment for generations. And what a beautiful place Selsey is as a result! This balance has allowed marine life, birds etc to flourish, whilst the town has protected itself from erosion and sustainably used our natural resources (through fishing, tourism etc).
 
As described last month, this balance is now threatened by environmental regulation that is coming to Selsey under the guise of “protected areas” or “designated areas” with names like SPAs, SSSIs & MCZs. The animal that is not protected in these areas is the human being.
 
We’ve called for a less militant approach to the regulation of these zones, so that People’s needs can genuinely be taken into account, instead of being brushed aside. Our call is for “Compassionate Conservation”. We gave examples of the sort of compromise and commonsense we expect, in last month’s Selsey Life.
 
We said we’d be taking up the issue and we have done. We met a senior Natural England manager in London and explained that it was time for that organisation, and others, to address the needs of People. At the very least they must acknowledge that if a policy they are promoting harms properties,  livelihoods, or communities – they can’t evade responsibility for that outcome.
 
 Making them accountable is the first step to a dialogue about a less-rigid administration of “designated areas”, which involves balancing the needs of the human occupiers with those of geology, habitats, etc. Take a look at our website www.saveourselsey.org, for more details.