GORDON Prentice is to launch a campaign to help people hit by blight from road projects that take years to start - such as his constituents at the end of the M65 in Colne.

The Labour backbencher is asking people affected by blight to contact him. He said the proposal to extend the M65 eastwards from Colne, which had been talked about but never acted on for years, was a classic example of the problem.

Although it has now been dropped, the damage has been done.

As the Government published a discussion paper on the issue, Mr Prentice said: "The proposal has now been dropped by the Government, but blight still casts a shadow over land and property.

"I know from my own postbag how damaging blight can be. It can ruin a person's health with all the worry and anxiety.

"The uncertainty about the eastwards extension of the M65 sterilised land and property in Pendle for years - and it is still not finally resolved, even though the Government has made it crystal clear the M65 is not going beyond Colne.

"The Government is looking afresh at the law relating to blight and compensation and not before time."

Mr Prentice knows a great deal about the issue after spending nine months as a member of the Channel Tunnel Raillink Committee, which examined the effect of the proposed London to Tunnel Link on the communities along the line of the railway.

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