Wealden District Councillors were sent the following by FoBW before the planning meeting on 26th February.
Dear Councillor
Please refuse this planning application
The decision Wealden District Council makes on Thursday will determine their attitude to recreational facilities, critical ecological centres and will affect thousands of residents.
I attach a number of documents. Collectively they’re shorter than the officers report but because of the way this application is being treated the facts need to be correct. We ask you whether you are on the planning committee or not to understand how critical this application is for your residents.
The planning application that would – if approved – cause irreversible harm to Bewl Water’s community facilities and internationally important wildlife. Since the similar application was rejected and the appeal dismissal in September 2024, new and highly material evidence has emerged. This decision is NOT one solely around lighting and its mitigation. These new facts must be taken into account, and a full and considered assessment of the planning evidence again points overwhelmingly to refusal.
The key new material is:
- New ecological evidence (Campbell 2025 + updated Phelps findings) – These reports were not available to the previous Inspector and show Bewl Water’s winter gull roost is nationally significant, with 100,000+ birds in some years, and no alternative roost sites. Even low‑level, intermittent night disturbance can cause total roost abandonment, with international ecological consequences (Campbell; Phelps).
- New evidence that Bewl Water is under active assessment for SPA designation – The Parish Council has been told that Natural England will announce SPA and SSI status for Bewl Water in March 2026. The Council is seeking clarification.
- New ecologist (Charmaine Noel MCIEEM) and arboriculturist evidence commissioned by Wadhurst PC. This concludes the applicant’s ecology work is not compliant with industry standards, was done at the wrong time of year, omits required surveys, uses no up‑to‑date LERC data, and understates protected species risks.
- New national and local policy context –
- The High Weald National Landscape Management Plan 2024–29 now applies.
- The Wadhurst Neighbourhood Plan 2024 is in now in force, including WAD16 (Dark Skies) policy, which explicitly warns against glazing and lighting near water.
- The strengthened s.85 CROW Act duty now requires authorities to seek to further natural beauty, not merely have regard.(These constraints were not before the 2024 Inspector.)
- Wealden District Council declared a biodiversity crisis in May 2025.
- The Sussex Nature Recovery Partnership — responsible for delivering the Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS) for East Sussex has just published Local Habitat Maps. These show Bewl Water as an Area of Particular Importance for Biodiversity (APIB) and an Area that Could Become Important for Biodiversity (ACIB); confirming Bewl Water’s role as a strategic nature‑recovery location. The LNRS also lists the Mediterranean Gull, which roosts at Bewl Water as a ‘priority species.
- Wealden District Council launched a £1.2m Wilder Wealden partnership with Sussex Wildlife Trust, in November 2025. “Wilder Wealden aims to reverse biodiversity decline, restore ecosystems, and embed nature‑recovery principles into council policies and planning.”
- Wealden’s partner, The Sussex Wildlife Trust, has strongly objected to this application.
- New evidence on dark‑skies failure – The applicant’s new lighting assessment is shown to be defective, using wrongly placed receptors, focusing on humans not wildlife, offering no credible mitigation for open balconies, hot‑tub lights, headlights, or open doors and windows.
- The High Weald AONB Unit’s Planning Technical Advice Note: Dark Skies in the High Weald (July 2024) specifically excludes operational mitigation measures that are “dependant on behavioural habits of the building user” ….. “as such cannot be used as conditions on planning permissions as they would fail tests of reasonableness and enforceability.”
- New evidence on noise impacts –Bewl Water acts as a natural amphitheatre, and even small, intermittent night‑time noise and/or light events risk driving the gull roost away permanently. Conditions cannot control people on balconies, hot tubs, car movements, door opening, or party behaviour at night.
- New evidence of facility loss and harm to community sport –
- The Sailing Club, Canoe Club, Paddle UK, Midweekers and Fly Fishers all object.
- Facilities claimed to be “retained” are shown to be inadequate, much smaller, and cannot serve regattas. Sharing changing facilities with the public means that safeguarding is not possible – so there can be no junior training.
- Olympians such as Emily Craig (Olympic Gold 2024 double sculls winner) trained at Bewl Water – removing facilities would impact future generations
- Wealden DC’s own Leisure & Wellbeing Team warn that the loss of these facilities would harm public health and wellbeing.
- The January 2026 Downash decision – Another planning Inspector recently dismissed a holiday‑let development near Bewl for harming rurality, tranquillity and immersion in nature. These findings apply directly here but were not considered by the case officer in his amended report. They should be taken into account.
- These facts were not before the previous Inspector.
Why these issues matter
- Bewl Water is one of the darkest, quietest, and most ecologically sensitive landscapes in the High Weald. It is earmarked as an APIB and an ACIB.
- The proposal would destroy the only community water sports clubhouse on the reservoir/in the area and remove vital water‑sport facilities built with public (Sports Council) money, used for decades and linked to Olympic athletes.
- It would cause night‑time noise and light directly on the shoreline — the most sensitive place for the largest overwintering gull roost in the UK .
- DEFRA is actively considering national SPA designation. Approving irreversible harm now would be reckless and premature.
On the basis of new material evidence, new policies, and the clear risks to wildlife, public wellbeing, and community facilities, this application must be refused.
Bewl Water is too important — ecologically and socially — to ruin for a handful of holiday lets.
Wealden District Council has committed almost £1.2m to a partnership with Sussex Wildlife Trust to “create a connected network of habitats, helping wildlife thrive while supporting local communities. Wilder Wealden aims to reverse biodiversity decline, restore ecosystems, and embed nature recovery principles into council policies and planning. The Sussex Wildlife Trust has strongly objected to this proposal. Please listen to your partner and support their request to work with them “to protect the site for future generations”.
In May 2025 the Alliance for WDC declared a biodiversity crisis which gives their vision for Wealden as “a place where people and nature thrive together” and also sets out their ambition to get things done including “major investment in sports and leisure facilities and other community assets”, creating “creating a greener, fairer, kinder Wealden” and a plan that “puts an emphasis on nature restoration”
We are not asking you to reverse decline, we ask you simply not to contribute to it.
This scheme will contribute nothing towards furthering the government’s housing plans, while causing grievous damage to community wellbeing. In short, it will benefit the few over the many.
Kind regards,
The Friends of Bewl Water
