This week, the Prime Minister launched a new scheme to sort out the chronic lack of affordable housing in Britain. Plans included dealing with the wealth inequality that meant only the richest few, with the bank of their parents, could access the best housing, making planning permissions easier and giving authorities facing the greatest financial pressures access to the resources they need. As a house buyer in the not too distant future, I welcome this. I want someone to live that is a pleasant and affordable.
Part of the scheme also featured imposing house building targets on local authorities who chose not to build houses because, well, there are in some people's backyards. Sajid Javid, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, said overly nimby councils may even have independent inspectors imposed on them, ready to make decisions about housing that councils were too scared to take. While I remain supportive of the need for more housing – urgently – I can't help but understand and sympathize with the concerns of nimbyists. Some buildings in my area are soon be modernised. The outsides will look different and they will have fundamentally changed. One of the buildings included a small shop. For most of the time it was open, I thought little of it. It was a place to get the essentials, the people were friendly; it fulfilled my short term, immediate needs. I, and I'm sure many other people, were shocked to find out after all these years it was to no longer be open, replaced in the distant future by another store. Waiting in queues, I couldn't help but overhear the surprise of other residents: 'But why?', 'You're always busy!' Nothing to do with financial problems at the shop, but new ventures and a desire for improved, renovated housing. I'm sure I would welcome improved accommodation wherever it was. It was a surprise, yes, but there would be a new shop and hopefully aesthetically pleasing housing with law abiding residents. Yet I'm sure I would be far more supportive of new flats were I to live further away from them, were I not to be directly affect by the sound of renovation, were my movements in that area not to be restricted due to health and safety. While work goes on, there's another convenience store nearby, but it will be an inconvenience, an extra trudge to arrive there. That forgets people who live further away from the other shop or have physical instability. It was then I realized, for the first time ever, I had become a nimby. The developments are going to take place. Relevant petitions against the change were filed, looked over but not acted upon. In my area, the main priority is ensuring the changes are as quick, smooth and safe as possible. Up and down the country, small developments that most people know nothing of are taking place, supposedly for the good of residents past, present and yet to arrive. Despite the economic, environmental and social concerns for every one of those small projects, it is only the huge, nationwide projects that are fully discussed on the news and political discussion programmes. Until the tsunami of Brexit dominated the BBC's Question Time week after week, I'm sure that, in around half of the towns affected by HS2 that were visited, there would be a question on whether HS2 should continue, or even begin in the first place. Nearly every time I watched, the applause for the panellist opposing HS2 would be thunderous, a mass of universal approval compared to the unlucky so and so who tried to make the case for such a scheme. When I visit the Stop HS2 website, there are many astute arguments against the proposals, including the environmental cost. The situation is the same with fracking. In Blackpool, the location for last week's Question Time, the situation was the same. Nigel Farage and Ken Clarke stated firm support for fracking, citing the jobs it will create and good it will do for the economy. They were met with boos, if I correctly remember only one person in the audience spoke in support of fracking. Would Mr Farage be so supportive of fracking were it in Thanet? Could Mr Clarke change his tune if Rushcliffe were to be affected by drilling into the ground? With these scenarios, to what extent is the opposition, genuine and principled or simply due to the project taking place near to you live? The same question could be applied in relation to a Third runway at Heathrow. Opposition to more flights unites Caroline Lucas, Sadiq Khan and Zac Goldsmith, not exactly on similar sides of the political spectrum. Some of the main arguments made against the runway are the noise, environmental damage and the volume of homes and communities that will be drastically affected. John McDonnell made those arguments so fervently in 2009, removing the parliamentary mace, that he was ordered to leave the chamber. 17 months on from my first blog on the matter, I remain just as undecided on the matter. Would my opinion be so neutral if it was my house, my school, my favourite bookshop being demolished? I'm opposed to total nimbyism. People who are very happy for projects of any size to be built far away before avidly campaigning against development just because it's closer to home are hypocrites. The arguments for and against a new scheme, whether it's a national runway or a tiny building, should be based around the economic cost, damage to the environment and yes, the effects on residents. But to simply rule out a new proposal, because some people aren't happy, is nothing but selfish. This really comes down to what we want as individuals. Surely security, for ourselves, our families and local people is a key part of human nature. Everything remaining as it is, free from change, means security can be maintained. A change in our environment on any level represents a lack of security. Why change? Even if the current situation isn't great, nobody knows what will be there next time. I can't control the development, so I must stop it. This, of course, isn't sustainable. While I will always fight for the beauty of my local environment and the world's natural environment to remain as it is, safe from exploitation, using that excuse to prevent any new development is close minded and will not benefit future generations. They need access to the best infrastructure and access. Philip Larkin famously said that how we live measures our own nature. Those of us currently on the planet have a duty, an obligation to pass that on those who succeed us. Most plans are coming up in my area. In the waterworks are plans for another station and a train, which I have pragmatically accepted are necessary schemes. However, thanks to the metro mayor (a scheme I still believe should be immediately abolished) there are simmering proposals for an underground throughout the city. It would be an irreversible transformation of the city I love from a place of immovable history and culture to one of permanent rush, unbearable noise and dirty air. If the proposition goes forward, my nimbyism will reach levels never seen, levels I didn't know I had. If we as humans don't want any security and continuity, a few parts of our surroundings to remain the same throughout our lives, what do we want?
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