Wildlife in peril on site of abandoned Cleethorpes theme park

We need to get Chris Packham onto it

Money talks unfortunately.

THE Lidl-led consortium seeking to redevelop the former Pleasure Island theme park in Cleethorpes with a supermarket and holiday lodges has cleared a major hurdle.

It has today learned that it will not be required to provide an environmental assessment of the impact its project will have on the wildlife that lives on the site.

That means that birds, bats, water voles and a family of badgers are now in real peril of being displaced, while scores of mature trees and shrubs face the chop.

The consortium's agents have acknowledged that the site is home to a badger sett, "several" bat roosts and birds such as reed warbler, little grebe, mute swan, kingfisher, little egret and Cetti’s warbler on or around the lake. 

But it says "mitigation" can be provided in the form, for  instance, of "nesting opportunities" for birds (including cuckoos!) and flight "corridors" for bats.

North East Lincolnshire Council has accepted this assurance and agrees there will be "no significant effect" on the environment.