THE Scottish Government has signalled for the first time it may intervene in a controversial quarry extension near the New Lanark World Heritage Site.
Planning Minister Derek Mackay has ordered South Lanarkshire Council to notify his department if it plans to grant planning permission.
If that happens, the minister will have 28 days to decide whether to block the plans or call in a reporter to investigate the situation for the Government.
The move follows vocal local protests and a critical Parliamentary motion which has been backed by 24 MSPs, including Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie.
Cement company Cemex has lodged plans to expand its Hyndford Quarry into the buffer zone around New Lanark, adjacent to the historic viewpoint overlooking the Falls of Clyde.
The falls have inspired generations of poets and painters, including William Wordsworth and JMW Turner, while 18th-century New Lanark is famous as the setting for Robert Owen's model of utopian socialism.
Joan McAlpine, the MSP who tabled the motion, said: "I am not surprised the minister has taken this step, but I hope it is not necessary and South Lanarkshire Council reject the proposal. While New Lanark itself is a world-class example of industrial and social heritage, it cannot be separated from the surrounding landscape."
The proposed expansion would result in lowering the landscape by 100ft in places, with 3.6 million tonnes of sand and gravel extracted from the area over six years.
Today, Ms McAlpine will meet Historic Scotland, the Government agency protecting national heritage that has been criticised for not opposing the plans.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article