To describe Fishbourne as a Service Village is blatantly wrong. It has very few facilities, no surgery and only one shop. It has a Primary school that is always at full capacity with waiting lists. The community centre provides a wide range of facilities that are already very successful and which attract customers from a wide region and does not rely solely on Fishbourne to sustain itself. Yet proposals suggest that Fishbourne can accommodate the same increase in housing numbers as, for example, Bosham who have shops, hotels, takeaways, pubs, and a GP surgery, and accommodate more additional houses than Hunston, who have many more facilities than Fishbourne.

Your policies state that 'to protect the landscape, character, quality and tranquillity of the countryside it is essential to prevent inappropriate development'. Development of this scale in Fishbourne is inappropriate and does not meet this policy. As a result of the late introduction to a wildlife corridor to the East of Fishbourne, proposed land availability in the village has been halved and the village no longer has the capacity for 250 new houses without destroying its rural character. The allocated number of 250 homes in Fishbourne should be reduced to account for the removal of potential land available for development. Due to the introduction of the wildlife corridor, the remaining large site identified for housing in Fishbourne is land on Bethwines Farm. I believe it is fundamentally wrong to promote building on a viable arable farm when many suitable brownfield sites are still available within the District. Losing Bethwines Farm to development would not only impact on local jobs but would also destroy the village landscape and character.
Although a wildlife corridor is proposed between Fishbourne and the new development currently under construction on Clay Lane, there doesn't appear to have been any consideration given to the wildlife on the West side of Fishbourne. Kites, foxes, buzzards, badgers, water voles, geese, and bats are all frequently observed on and around the Bethwines Farm area, raising the question that perhaps it would also be appropriate to designate the West of Fishbourne as a wildlife corridor too? Building on the West side of Fishbourne will have a significant negative impact on our wildlife.

If additional housing is required in Chichester District, we should be first looking to regenerate existing brown field sites and also to do more to develop our coastal area and enable our tourism industry to grow. Many other towns and villages along the coast of Britain already take advantage of their location to improve their economy without detriment to the environment, for example along the Jurassic Coast in Dorset. I would like to see increased numbers of homes and businesses in the area south of the A27 to Selsey, giving more opportunity for water sports and marine based tourism to grow.

In summary, the additional housing proposed for Fishbourne should be reduced from 250 to recognise there is limited land available in the village especially since the introduction of the East wildlife corridor. Your own policies are now acting to promote the destruction of one of the areas viable farms by building in a strategic gap between villages and, judging by previous withdrawn Planning Applications on Bethwines Farm, leaving the door open for the future construction of 100's of more houses in the future. How can this be in keeping with your countryside policy? Rather than destroying the rural character of the District's villages, we should be concentrating on fully developing Brownfield sites and doing all we can to encourage our tourism industry by providing greater opportunity to take advantage of the coast around the Manhood Peninsula. The current proposals as they stand do not give this adequate consideration.