I don’t normally take much interest in planning applications, appeals and disputes, but one that is local to me piqued my curiosity as it involves a burning issue, literally. This is the application by the waste management company Veolia to build an incinerator not too far from Jane Austen’s house at Chawton. Given that it is in an area of breathtaking countryside and despite objections from Alan Titchmarsh, CPRE Hampshire, the South Downs National Park Authority and Historic England, among others, the authorities appear to be giving it the go-ahead.
What particularly caught my eye was the following: “But despite this overwhelming opposition, the report states the proposal will ‘allow residual waste, which cannot be reused or recycled, to be managed at the most reasonable level of the waste hierarchy, diverting it from landfill’.”
Excuse me - the waste hierarchy? I would dearly love to hear an explanation from Veolia or Hampshire county council as to what this means exactly, otherwise I think that the application should be thrown out on the grounds that it contains elements that are an offence against the English language.
Now, how do you normally buy your clothes? I imagine physically or online. Oh please, do get up to speed.
Read the following breathless press release: “Designer fashion has been merged even further with the metaverse with the world’s first ever Metaverse Fashion Week, which began yesterday. Being accessible to all, fundamentally sustainable and catering easily to the constant churn of new trends is something which the physical world is unable to do: the metaverse is the future.”
I wrote last week about the metaverse and the dangers that can befall you while wearing VR headsets or staring at the computer screen. This now adds to the confusion. Do you own the clothes? Do they actually exist? It’s all very confusing.
I think I’ll go back to the altogether simpler world of planning applications.
• Jonathan Bouquet is an Observer columnist
