E&I vice-president explains why he is against new quarry
ENVIRONMENT & Infrastructure’s vice-president has explained why he has dissented from the rest of his committee when it came to the future of quarrying in the island.
Committee president Lindsay De Sausmarez, along with members Deputies Andy Cameron, Simon Fairclough and Adrian Gabriel, have opted to support behind opening up a new quarry at Chouet headland, which could ensure the continuation of local stone extraction for up to 35 years.
However, Deputy Sam Haskins has taken the view that the island should, when Les Vardes Quarry is exhausted, begin importation instead.
E&I will present the two options to States members for debate this autumn, to define which route the island takes in meeting the construction industry’s demand for aggregate.
Deputy Haskins said he had weighed up the effects of quarrying on the island’s environment, social amenity and heritage aspects of the site, and come to the conclusion that they were more important than ‘the slight increase to the overall costs to the construction industry' which he said would be passed on to the consumer.
‘This is something we, as a government, can choose to mitigate if we thought making houses more affordable is important, which I do.’
Quarrying Chouet headland now would mean the loss of a strategic reserve in the future, should there be unforeseen global events, he added.
‘Looking to the longer term, choosing to open a new quarry only delays the inevitable of future importation, which we do currently for the overwhelming majority of goods such as cement, timber, food and medicine,’ he said.
He urged islanders with strong views either way to contact deputies and said he had received feedback from many people saying that they preferred a move to importation.
Deputy De Sausmarez said her committee was not at odds with each other.
She admitted that while the economic arguments for quarrying at Chouet were strong, the environmental considerations were far more nuanced.
She said all the committee members had wavered on which option to take and one had come down on the other side of the line to the others.
The proposal to begin excavating at Chouet has drawn criticism from nearby residents, who fear there will be a profound effect on the immediate environment which they say would impact on their health and the value of their properties.
The report highlights the greater carbon footprint that would be generated by importing, rather than extracting locally, the island’s aggregate, and warns against ‘offshoring’ the problem – shifting the environmental degradation to another jurisdiction.
It also stresses the determination on the part of the States and Ronez to take measures around the site, and elsewhere on the island, to mitigate and compensate for any harm done to biodiversity.
