As a Calne resident since 1987 I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to those eight brave Wiltshire county councillors who voted against the Hills Waste Solutions planning application to make permanent and expand their waste processing facility at Lower Compton.

By standing up to the vested interests of big business, and listening to the views of those affected by the traffic noise and pollution in our town that results from the existing traffic to and from the Hills site, they may have saved the local environment of our town for future generations and we are in their debt.

As for the Hills Waste Solutions response, to me this demonstrates a breath-taking degree of arrogance, that they could be so insensitive to local opinion by pursuing their case with the Planning Inspectorate is beyond belief.

If the good councillors had voted in favour of the Hills application, at least the electorate could have shown their displeasure at the next local elections and voted accordingly.

But if the council’s decision is then overruled by the Planning Inspectorate I ask your readers to consider what this says about local democracy and the rights of local people versus the rights of a big business whose only concern is maximising their profit? I can only say that if Hills is successful in its appeal it will make a complete mockery of local democracy and especially the principle of ‘localism’ whereby local elected politicians have the final say on planning applications affecting their area.

We can only hope that the Planning Inspectorate will consider the big issue of local democracy rather than the finer legal points of planning law that Hills Waste Solutions’ legal team will no doubt be arguing for.

Graham Carroll, Maple Close, Calne.