Lynne Beaumont & John Hughes, Lib Dem Candidate, Folkestone Park Ward.

Dear Mr Botley, Thanks for your letter dated 9 April 2003. We have discussed the issues you have raised and, finding that we were in agreement about all of them, are sending a single reply on behalf of us both. DUNGENESS We could not support new build at Dungeness.In addition to the waste issue to which you refer, we do not believe that nuclear power is an economically viable method of producing power. RENEWABLE ENERGY We welcome development of wind farms in the district subject, of course, to a thorough environmental impact assessment of developments proposed. GM FOODS We have very deep concern about the cultivation of GM crops, whether commercially or at trial sites, and believe that the growing of GM crops has severe environmental implications of cross-pollination, not just to non-GM crops, but also to hedgerows, woodlands and other non- cultivated areas. We support our national party's stand that there should be a five year moratorium on commercial exploitation of GM technology. EMERGENCY PLAN We are aware of the existence of Shepway's local plan. Potassium lodate tablets should be available for everyone in the district, and the emergency plan should provide for distribution of these in the event of an emergency. CYCLING We would like to see greater priority given to promotion of cycling as a means of transport in the district - particularly for journeys to work and schools. Provision of safe cycling routes would be important, and we would vigorously pursue the necessary investment from KCC. Reduction of the number of school-run car journeys is an important objective for us: we would like to see one or more walking buses set up for Park Farm primary school and have raised this matter with the school authorities. OPERATION STACK We believe that the way forward in reducing HGV traffic on the roads must be investment in, and subsidy of, rail freight traffic. For example, "Piggy backing" of road trailers on rail vehicles is a simple technology which the UK has totally failed to exploit. We would support the pursuit of alternative road traffic management measures to Operation Stack. We believe however that the construction of a temporary lorry park would be altogether too draconian a measure to tackle the sporadic inconvenience caused by Operation Stack, given the serious environmental impact of constructing such a park. RECYCLING We think it is scandalous that Shepway will fall far short of government targets for recycling household waste. We are convinced by experiences elsewhere that this need not be the case, and that adoption of a comprehensive scheme for separation of waste for kerbside collection would, as a minimum, permit targets to be met. Improvement of recycling facilities has been a significant issue pressed home in our pre-election publicity. Thank you once again for giving us the opportunity to put forward our views on a range of important environmental issues. Yours sincerely, Lynne Beaumont, John Hughes