Resort for super-rich damned as 'ludicrous'

Published on Sunday 30 August 2009 22:42

SCOTLAND'S leading wildlife conservation group has branded plans for a playground for the super-rich in Highland Perth-shire as "ludicrous".

The Scottish Wildlife Trust (SWT) claims the environmental arguments in support of a 1.3 billion redevelopment of the Dall Estate on the banks of Loch Rannoch breach Scottish and European conservation laws.

The charity submitted its objections to the proposed development to Perth and Kinross Council today, the deadline for comments.

It joined more than 300 objectors to the proposals.

The council now has until 22 November to decide whether to give the go-ahead to the controversial plan to create a golfing resort so elite that the developer, Malcolm James, claims the number one golfer in the world, Tiger Woods, would not be able to afford membership.

However, Tony King, the head of policy at the Scottish Wildlife Trust, said: "This planning proposal is ludicrous.

"The environmental assessment included with the proposal is inherently flawed and makes no attempt to give the true impact of the development on protected species in the area such as the red squirrel and the narrow-headed ant.

"Perth and Kinross Council have a legal duty to dismiss this application which is in clear breach of section 1 of the Nature Conservation (Scotland) Act."

The organisation has also claimed that the proposal breaches the EU Habitats Directive.

Mr James employed leading Scottish golf architect Calum A Todd to design the two courses which would be central to the development.

Mr Todd hit out at the project's critics, in particular the Scottish Woodland Trust, which has claimed the proposal would lead to the destruction of 400 acres of ancient woodland.

"The statements from the Woodland Trust are totally without foundation," Mr Todd said to The Scotsman.

"Their comments do the organisation a disservice and represent a series of statements that are at best misinformed."

Mr Todd also questioned the claims that the seven-storey Broch restaurant, which has been designed like a crannog within Loch Rannoch, would have an impact on the spawning ground of rare fish the Arctic char, as other groups have claimed.

"The loch is some 11 miles long by one mile wide so even if the spawning requirements of the char did apply at the minute area of the Broch, they would simply go elsewhere," Mr Todd said.