Council planning reports state that the land is of fair agricultural value and only suitable for grazing and cropping and not considered highly productive agricultural land. What a condescending statement!

All dry land farms are suited for those enterprises and all dry land farmers would be offended if they were told that their farms were of low value land.

Their land is their livelihood and that makes it highly valuable!

Have there been any nutrient or soil structure tests done that will validate these assertions or is it just a guess from some planning bureaucrat?

Many learned people are now showing concern that farmland is being taken out of the food producing chain due to development pressures.

The claim is that only one family would be affected by the acquisition.

This is quite wrong, as it does not take into account the service providers such as fuel, merchandise agents, agronomists, shearers, stock agents plus many more that are involved in supporting farm enterprises.

This attitude just goes to show how narrow minded the Council-planning department is.

If industrial land is so sought after, why did the 25 ha of land on Victa Rd near the airport stand vacant for so long with only one business there, or was this another council ”stuff up”.

Who would pay for this acquisition?

Would it to be more borrowing on top of our large level of debt that we have at the moment, when Governor of the Reserve Bank is already warning all Governments of the difficulties associated with the impending interest rate rises.

It should also be noted that manufacturing jobs are the most disappearing jobs in Australia, with 60,000 jobs being shed in the last five years.

Where farmland has been occupied, nurtured and worked on for generations through good years and bad, there tends to be an emotional bond that many outside farming do not understand and by taking part of someone’s farm, has the potential of making the rest of the farming operation unviable.

In my opinion, it is clear that the C.E.O. is trying to influence the decision, whilst the Mayor has been quite silent on this issue. If this proposal goes through, I hope the proponents sleep well Wednesday night.

Unfortunately Lockington’s hairdresser had to ‘shut shop’ and move for personal reasons and now the community, without these special services, would dearly love a replacement. 

The community want to ‘shop locally’, also some members have not the time, nor transport, to go to another town.

Senior Citizens with ‘gophers’ have been able in the past to take themselves to hair appointments without the need of a car, and children go after school hours without inconveniencing farming families.

Lockington would dearly love to see a hairdresser functioning in town as soon as possible.