It is ludicrous that consultation by the council has been limited and only a few residents have been consulted over what the council want to do in Hockley. In my view this is underhand and the council must not carry on this way.

It is equally ludicrous that the idea of a 'landscaped footway link' on the Spa Road church ground had not been broached with those who own the land. Are the council serious when they waffle on (apparently) and say they didn't know who owned the land ?

The council seem to lack empathy for the Hockley village and whilst they say they want to hear of residents concerns it remains that these must then steer any agreed development of Hockley village not be dismissed.

Why do the council interpret 'making improvements' as 'we want supermarkets and large car parks in Hockley' or 'we want to tear down existing buildings to make way for more flats and/or houses'. Yes, there are sensible improvements to be made and I expect these would be welcomed but I do not see why a strategy for development of Hockley village (or any other village for that matter) must be large scale/all or nothing. The village does not need to be anything other than self-sufficient (for want of a better term) and disproportionately disruptive or major changes are not required. A sledgehammer 'solution' is not required.

I believe the softly-softly approach IS possible. This must be the starting point even if making improvements may be a daunting task, if softly-softly is the approach that Hockley residents would like to take why should it not be so?

For what its worth, I have a few suggestions that may fuel a (much needed) brainstorm on the subject:

- Move the library into the old fire station (save £30K on Fire Station running costs)
- Extend the Jones practice onto space vacated by library
- Bring outlying shops (eg beauticians in Southend Road) into Hockley village and allow favourable rates/leases etc to those doing so
- Encourage outlying shops around the area to move into the village existing premises eg Golf-in one (Rayleigh) might be interested in moving
- Shops next to the White Hart pub may be interested in re-locating to the village
- Introduce a covenant to govern the (good) appearance of shops/premises in the village and adopt a 'model village' approach

I'm sure there are plenty of other ideas that have yet to be considered and investigated