Setback for Bluestone (From Western Telegraph)

Setback for Bluestone

William McNamara's dream of creating the Bluestone holiday village could evaporate on Monday if planners insist he finds an alternative site - outside the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park.

Ifor Jones, head of conservation at the National Park Authority, is recommending that the planning application is refused.

But the final decision will be made by members of the development control committee when they meet at an extraordinary meeting at Narberth on Monday.

Mr McNamara remains hopeful that the committee will support the plan. He had unsuccessfully explored the option of other sites, he insisted, and described as 'ridiculous' the suggestion that he should consider alternatives.

"We have looked and there isn't one, so another site is definitely not an option,'' he told the Western Telegraph. "It has taken four years to put the land package together and two years to get funding on this site. If a site outside of the National Park could have been found, it would have been.''

But Ifor Jones believed that proposing the Bluestone development in the National Park remained 'fundamentally inappropriate'. But it was possible that a suitable site could be identified outside the National Park, he stated in his report, and officers were willing to work with the developers to consider alternatives.

Mr Jones was also concerned that siting Bluestone in the National Park would set a precedent. Mr McNamara disagreed. "Center Parcs built their third holiday village, Longleat, twice the size of Bluestone, in an area of outstanding natural beauty which is the same designation and afforded the same protection as National Park,'' he said.

Pembrokeshire County Council has already granted planning permission for a waterworld and snow centre adjacent to the holiday village site.