WOULD you take out a loan in order to pay the business expenses of a multi-million pound company with whom you have no connection and no debts?

Well, that’s just what we have all done. 

When the Staplegrove major housing development was approved, Tory members of Taunton Deane Borough Council’s Planning Committee allowed the developer to wriggle out of the 25 per cent target of affordable housing.

They accepted a meagre 15 per cent, against the opposition of the Liberal Democrats. 

Last week’s County Gazette featured an account of Government funding to pay for the restoration of 25 per cent affordable housing and early delivery of the spine road connecting the Staplegrove housing development. 

The article included a lot of cloying mutual congratulation by the Tory Minister, MP and council leader, and the developer who will pocket extra profits as a result.

READ MORE: £7.2m funding secured for Staplegrove spine road

Don’t get me wrong. I am delighted that Staplegrove will get its spine road on time and that the Tory cop-out on affordable housing has been reversed, but why should the taxpayer pick up the tab?

The result will increase Government borrowing, which our children will have to pay back. Also, why is there no social housing for rent among the affordable housing? 

The decision to let the Staplegrove developers off the hook will act as a green light for other developers to renege on their commitments to social housing and infrastructure, as the Comeytrowe/Trull consortium is trying to do now.

ALAN PAUL
Taunton