Villagers four year ‘David versus Goliath’ fight against new sewage works on their doorstep
The Save Honey Hill campaigners have said they will battle on to the end,
For four years a group of villagers have been facing a “David versus Goliath” fight to try and stop a new sewage works being built near to their homes.
The Save Honey Hill campaigners have said they will battle on to the end, as Anglian Water looks to move its sewage plant from the edge of Cambridge to land nearby between Horningsea and Fen Ditton.
The water company is leading the project to relocate the Cambridge Waste Water Treatment Plant in order to free up the land the existing plant sits on for a new development of around 8,000 homes as well as new offices and science buildings.
Anglian Water and Cambridge City Council have been given £277million from Homes England to help fund the relocation project, which it is estimated will cost between £370million and £400million to complete.
A Development Consent Order (DCO) has been applied for to build the new sewage works, with a final decision expected later this year.
Catherine Morris, one of the campaigners who has spent the last four years fighting the project, said she first became aware that a sewage works could be built down the road from her home in Horningsea when a leaflet landed on her doormat in 2020.
This was the second time proposals to build a sewage plant near the village had reared its head.
She said: “In 2020 when this thing landed on the doormat it was a complete shock, because I just assumed stupidly that this whole thing had not been successful that first time round that it is finished we won’t have to worry about that again.
“One of the wonderful things about living in this village is that approach road.
“I have lived here now for over 30 years and I can honestly say it is one of the most lovely approaches to any village that I have ever seen anywhere, and I just could not understand how they could think that this was a good idea.
“It is such a short distance from where it currently is and it just does not make sense, they are literally shifting it sideways, it is not even like they are future proofing the site in terms of it being the furthest possible away from civilisation, it is just being shifted around the boundary of the city.”
Catherine said when she found out more about the land the new sewage works is proposed to be built on, including it being on a chalk aquifer, the more she became concerned about the plans.
She said: “I quite quickly progressed from being a NIMBY to realising actually there is much much bigger picture and this is really serious, this is something that everybody in Cambridge should be aware of.”
Elsewhere in the village others also heard about the plans to build a new sewage works down the road, including former parish councillor Margaret Starkie.
She said she quickly became involved in the new group that was forming to fight the plans, the Save Honey Hill group, and became the new campaign group’s chair.
With the process kicking off during the Covid-19 lockdown in 2020, the group’s first meetings were all held over Zoom as the new campaigners set about working out how to spread the word and how to fight the proposals.
The group managed to attract people from a range of backgrounds, including a solicitor, a water engineer, and a planning consultant.
Over the years the campaigners came up with some interesting ways to get their concerns across, even releasing two campaign songs sung by members of the community.
Liz Cotton, writer of the campaign song ‘It’s cr*p’, said she became aware of the plans to build the new sewage works near her home fairly late on, after a leaflet came through her door just before Christmas 2021.
She said: “I literally knew no one in Horningsea or Fen Ditton, I was not in the community at all, we were very much thinking about moving, because the kids had left home, when the leaflet came through about the sewage plant.
“I woke up on Christmas Day really stressed about it and thought ok I’m not sure we will be able to move immediately.”
Liz said as she was a comedy song writer she had the idea of writing a protest song as a way to get the message out about the project.
She explained that as she did not know anyone in the village she went knocking on doors to try and find people involved in the campaign.
Eventually Liz said she was put into contact with Catherine who invited her to a Zoom call with the Save Honey Hill group where she pitched her idea of writing and performing a protest song, which the campaigners agreed to.
After a couple of rehearsals the group organised to record the song in the village church with around 50 people turning up to take part.
Liz said: “Everyone picked up really quickly, it was really exciting. We have this great recording, I edited it and put it out there, and we had really great feedback.”
Liz also went on to write a show about the campaign against the sewage works that she performed in Edinburgh in 2022.
She said being a part of the campaign has changed her relationship to the village and said she now felt like she “really had some roots down here”.
Jennie Pratt, another campaigner from Horningsea, said recording the protest song had been one of her highlights of the campaign.
She said the whole process had been “four years of stress, fighting, and being infuriated”, adding that the “suspense continues” as the campaign was not over yet.
She said: “Life plans are still affected. But along the way there have been some great moments, meeting so many interesting, supportive people; recording the campaign songs in the church; being inspired by Save Honey Hill colleagues’ achievements; amazed by the skills that folk offered willingly.”
The examination period of the plans closed in April and the planning inspectors are expected to send a recommendation to the Secretary of State on whether the development should go ahead within the next few months.
After that it is expected to be another three month wait for the decision to be finally issued.
Catherine said it has been “exhausting and very challenging” at times over the last four years fighting the plans in what she described as a “David versus Goliath scenario”.
However, she said there had been a “silver lining” in bringing members of the community together who had not known each other before,
She said: “I have met an amazing group of people, we are quite an eclectic mix, but I have made some really good friends out of it.
“We actually had some fun, so it has not been all bad, but I would say it has been exhausting, it has been very challenging, but there have definitely been some plus sides to it.
“I had never done any campaigning of any note before, so it has been a completely new experience.”
Margaret said campaigning had been “very hard work” and said it had taken a toll on people.
She said: “Life goes on all the time and you don’t want to put too much strain on your family.
“My family has been extremely supportive, but I think they eventually got quite fed up with listening to things about sewage works over the dinner table.
“In some ways I found it energising because during lockdown when we were all in our houses, I was medically vulnerable, I could not go out at all, so I had no contact with outside people whatsoever, except via Zoom, so in some ways I found it very energising and it kept my brain alive.”
Margaret said the campaign was not over yet and said the group was “still battling”.
She said: “We will continue to fight right up until the decision is final and even then if the decision goes against us and we feel there are grounds for judicial review, we will go for that.”
Margaret said if the final decision does go against the group she would continue to try and hold the authorities to account on the subsequent developments in the area.
Catherine also said she would be looking at what comes forward next and that she will be looking at development around Cambridge “with more interest”.
She added that she would not “shy away from” a campaign like this again if it was something that mattered to her.
She also encouraged others to not be afraid of taking on a campaign about something they care about.
Catherine said: “Anybody who is feeling like they are about to embark on something like this, or want to embark on something like this, or are thinking to themselves ‘oh I don’t know, I don’t know whether to put myself out there’, I would say go for it.
“At the end of the day you can’t moan about anything unless you are prepared to do something about it.”