Geoffrey Cox, MP for Torridge & West Devon visited housing estate Drake Gardens in Tavistock to see the preliminary works taking place on site as a result of a five-year campaign to safeguard homes.
The MP has been working alongside West Devon Borough Council to bring the homes at Drake Gardens to a restored and marketable condition, after it was revealed that some were built on top of an old mine and could therefore be in danger of collapse.
In 2005, the council enlisted the help and support of the MP to persuade English Partnerships to find the money for a full investigation into the effects of old lead mine workings.
English Partnerships, however, was able to finance the £1 million remedial works up to a limit of 50 per cent, and the full sum could only be provided if a little known parliamentary procedure known as a ‘derelict land clearance order’ or DLCO was presented to the House of Commons. At the time there had been only two previous orders of this kind. The MP ensured the DLCO was pushed through Parliament and the full works have therefore been able to go ahead.
(from a press release)
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