News

Proposed housing development at Culloden

29 January 2014

Rt Hon Alex Salmond MSP, The Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh, EH99 1SP Dear Mr Salmond, I am writing to you about the proposed housing development on the inventoried battlefield at Culloden on behalf of the Battlefields Trust, a national charity dedicated to the preservation, interpretation and presentation of battlefields as historical and educational resources (see www.battlefieldstrust.com). The Trust opposes the proposed development at Culloden. It recognises that the site for which planning permission has been granted is brownfield land in the sense that it already contains farm buildings. The Trust is concerned about the precedent the permission to develop at Culloden sets for the wider battlefield and others inventoried in Scotland. The adoption of a permissive approach at Culloden risks inappropriate development on other brownfield sites on battlefields. The Trust therefore asks you to review this decision and to provide categoric public assurance that the planning permission currently granted should, in no way, be seen as a green light to developers to build on battlefield brownfield sites at Culloden or elsewhere. I look forward to receiving your reply Frank Baldwin