SO we have a new Swindon Borough Council Cabinet and a new leader of the council in Rod Bluh. Coun Bluh has stated that the new regime will have a "Green Agenda."

With this in mind I attended the first meeting of the new Planning Committee and was interested in two planning applications.

The first was for a huge new warehouse on the Keypoint estate at South Marston.

Keypoint was hailed as a railway interchange for trains coming from the Channel tunnel and was intended as an environmentally friendly location for transfer of freight.

It transpires that in several years of operation not a single train has used the facility only lorries to and from the two current warehouses.

The latest application is for yet another lorry-based facility with the resultant impact on Gablecross and the local residents.

The second application was for outline permission for the new Science Museum at Wroughton. Wroughton was originally developed as an airfield for the easy landing and take-off of planes, so is built on the top of a hill in the countryside.

The criteria for airfields are very different for motor vehicles. To put it bluntly, this is completely the wrong location for a museum of mass visitation.

I would suggest to Coun Bluh that he might like to learn from years of failed planning in Swindon, the local plans have been a disaster.

Along with the aforementioned we have the potential loss of valued irreplaceable countryside at Coate with the University of Bath's proposals. How anti-green have his predecessors been?

A new leader, a new cabinet, a new planning committee.

Nobody would deny that the Science Museum's aspirations will be great for Swindon.

If only they could have been located at Keypoint so visitors could arrive by train.

A HAYWARD Sparcells Swindon