David Milne, Hermit Point.
"It was when the proposals came in to sacrifice the SSSI that the whole thing really kicked off for me. That was when I took a better look at what was meant to be the trade off and found there wasn’t one. After all the SSSI is a supposedly protected site meant to be retained to help keep the balance of the planet and here it was being sacrificed for unprovable economic benefit. When we looked more closely it became obvious even that was all down to a very qualified appraisal that has never yet been looked at by any independent organisation.
This was long before there was any threat against our homes. It was in March 2009 that lawyers for T3 applied for compulsory purchase order (CPO) for our homes and October that year that Aberdeenshire Council failed to make a decision on this subject. We have now endured two Christmases with this threat hanging over us, all five households, and our position has not changed and no substantive contact has been made by T3.
The SSSI has been dug away and no one knows what effect this will have on Forvie nature reserve further north or the wildlife that used to live in this area. The reputation of the North East of Scotland has been irreparably damaged by the cavalier and cowardly actions of a small group of politicians and self-interested business people who seem to think they can do no wrong, and that the long-term environmental destruction caused by this housing development is acceptable as long as they make a profit. They are wrong.
It needs to be remembered by all that we do not inherit this earth from our ancestors; we borrow from our descendants.”