Can I point out to your readers that there has been no building at all on the Flashes? Not one brick has been laid. We have rusting fences, random mounds of earth and decaying straw bales but no whiff of a hotel.

So-called "work" ceased when the field where waste was tipped was absolutely piled full and no more could be fitted on. The so-called car park, which the barrister refers to in her report as being "levelled up" by the tipping of waste material, is simply a vast heap of uneven heaps of waste piled high. It is way above ground level and anyone who believes it was being"levelled up" must also believe in fairies.

I am stunned that after 12 months of being promised legal advice we have a report from someone who hasn't even visited the site. She (the barrister) would see that there is currently no work going on, nor has there been for many months. To pretend that the pandemic has prevented the barrister from visiting the site during the last 12 months is disingenuous to say the least. She was allowed to go to work. Nothing can have prevented her from looking at the site she was reporting on.

The "lake" is more like a disused quarry. During the warmer weather when the water levels dropped it was quite apparent that there had been random digging into the water table with no plan whatsoever. There were puddles here and there, deep water in some places and pieces of grass land dotted around. A complete mess with no wildlife left.

What is Craven District Council now going to do about the mess which has been allowed? Will they really leave it as it is so the mounds slowly green over, the fences rust even more and there is a constant reminder to locals of the death of their beautiful environment, that the rare and “protected” wildlife previously in abundance has gone? Photographers and birdwatchers who used to visit regularly will be horrified when they have a trip out to what used to be a fabulous area for bird watching.

Come on Paul Shevlin and your officers. Give us some proposals for repairing the mess. You could have paused the destruction as soon as it started for an examination of the planning issues. Enough people were writing to you for weeks and months to tell you about it. As for the "monitoring" of the destruction it seems to have consisted of occasional visits by a council worker to have a quick chat with the people digging up the area.

This episode brings shame on the council and makes a mockery of any pretence to care about the environment of Craven. Do the decent thing and sort it out properly, with full consultation with local people.

Angie Pedley

Hammerton Drive

Hellifield