We wish to contest your conclusions in respect of your consultation into the DBS Offshore Wind Farm Community Fund.

To be clear we acknowledge and support the priority being given to the residents of Bentley who will doubtless see material impact from the proposal.

But we must point out that the highest number of responses came from Walkington residents who will be significantly impacted. This response was substantially higher than the whole of Beverley, ten times our size.

204 respondents advocated the 3km zone as the preferred area of benefit, which includes Walkington. Only 151 backed the 5km zone, in spite of it drawing in a huge population from Beverley. Priority must therefore be given to both green and purple zones or Beverley with it's larger population will get a disproportionate benefit relative to the impact on their wider population, which is very small.

We support improvements to footpaths suggested by Rowley, and have a number of street scene projects we wish to undertake. HGV traffic through the village is a concern, and we wish to fund ANPR cameras to monitor and report those who flout the weight limit.

Most particularly we have been trying to raise funds to replace the building on our playing field which accommodates our preschool. The building is over sixty years old and inadequate. It offers changing facilities, but these do not respect gender and are not disabled friendly. There are thriving football and cricket teams, including youth cricket, but the facilities are not conducive to creating vibrant teams in women and girls sport.

We need to replace this with a suitable building which will cost around £750k. This will create a village amenity commensurate with our community's needs, including gender compatible changing facilities, an improved preschool facility and a covered and lit multi-sports area enabling increased sporting participation in the village.

Funding such a facility is very difficult as we are not in a deprived area which is a key driver in funding. As such a substantial contribution from the wind farm would represent an excellent start point in leveraging matched funding.

Our village hall is over thirty years old and refurbishment of around £70k have been identified as being required. Our pond needs continuing maintenance and is a considerable flood risk too.

As such in addition to the Bentley Priority Insight in section four we would wish to add the above items as a Walkington Priority Insight. In section five we support the near neighbour fund for Bentley, but believe that the core fund of up to 3km should have an earmark of £600k which we would bid against to meet the above village improvements in what is the largest village in the zone. This would still leave £360k for the wider area including those impacted north of Beverley.

In essence we respect the need to support those affected by the proposal in Bentley, but Walkington is a large community which is significantly impacted by the proposal, as can be demonstrated by the response from our community.

We look forward to working with you in creating an effective funding mechanism which respects the needs of those most affected by the proposal.

Yours Sincerely

Walkington Action Group