This evening Joe and I went to an interesting talk "What Science Can Tell Us About Stow" by Dr Belinda Colston which was organised by Friends of Stow Minster. Joe had been to an earlier talk in the series with a friend who was unable to go on this occasion, but it was my first.

As so often with these things it struck me how few people (18) there were there for the amount of effort it had taken to organise it, and the time taken to prepare the Powerpoint show and write the talk. There must be thousands of people concerned with the upkeep of their parish churches who could have learned a good deal about conservation from this talk. Sadly it was not widely advertised, and the bare title did not really give much of an indication what the the talk was really about; my own expectation had been (wrongly) something on the lines of the scientific analysis of historical items - carbon dating and the like - when it was actually about the environmental factors in damage and decay of ancient buildings.

Yesterday we had been to the much better attended (and much duller) meeting in our own village hall about SHLAA (Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment) propopsals for development in Swallow.

We were told that "Mr. John Ware, Senior Plans Development Officer for West Lindsey District Council will explain the significance of the SHLAA proposals within the planning process and how it will become part of the Local Development Framework, which will become the successor to the Local Plan, which provides for the future planning development in the District.

We are at the early stages of this ongoing process but in view of the potential impact of this March 2008 document on the future of Swallow, Swallow Parish Council felt that residents should have an opportunity to hear WLDC's plans for the future and to discuss issues with the Planning Department."

This arose because WLDC had, on government orders, invited land owners to put forward possible developement sites. Sutton estates, which owns a sizeable proportion of Swallow's farmland had responded and this had appeared on the WLDC website translated in terms of average density of housing as an apparent proposal to increase the size of Swallow to more than double. Understandably this got a number of village knickers in a right old twist, while others of us regarded it as being about as likely to become reality as finding a unicorn grazing in the garden. The meeting was called to clarify the situation.

Personally I felt quite sorry for this poor man - a virtual stranger to the area - having to face questioning (mainly politely, but quite forcefully put) from the great and the good of the village including a barrister, a journalist and several local government officers (both retired and still active) over policies which were not of his devising and past events of which he had no knowledge. Naturally he was unable to give us any concrete assurance that Sutton Estates' offer will not come to fruition although there is so much against it in terms of lack of infrastructure, lack of sustainability, being a site in a designated Area of Oustanding Natural Beauty etc. that the chances of its becoming a part of any future local developement plan seem to me very remote. No doubt, however, those who went to the meeting assuming it to be an undesireable fait accompli will equally have heard nothing to alter their opinion.