£420 raised for the Danes Moss legal and restoration fund has passed it past the £15,000 threshold.

The money was raised on Saturday October 1, during a day celebrating the South Macclesfield beauty spot, which is threatened by a proposed housing development and link road on the site.

Campaigners want to raise £70,000 to mount a challenge to stop the 950 homes on the fringes of a nature reserve.

"We held a DANES MOSS DAY on Danes Moss (the proposed development site) from 10-1300 on Saturday October 1," said SAVE DANES MOSS' Tom Eccles.

Macclesfield Conservative MP David Rutley was in attendance.

"Local councillors and Macclesfield MP David Rutley attended. Total attendance approx 150 people. Weather was ideal to show the beauty of the site - sunny.

"Activities included talks from Dr Roger Meade - who led the restoration of the Danes Moss Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in the 1970/80s. Dr Meade was former Senior Advisor on Peatlands to English Nature - the government body that became Natural England.

"Elsewhere there were presentations from Simon Caporn, Professor of Ecology and Environment at Manchester Metropolitan University. 

"There was a cake sale, t-shirt sale and biodegradable glitter tattoos which helped to raise a total of £420 for the cause."

Less than 300 acres of unspoilt green space remains.

Danes Moss is a historic peat bog and according to Cheshire Wildlife Trust, 'one of the scarcest and most threatened habitats in the UK'.

The new homes want to be built just outside the Reserve, in land partly owned by Cheshire East Council.

Cheshire East Council have refused numerous Nub News requests for comment regarding the site, but recently spoke on the matter to campaigners.

In response, a letter has been sent to the council.

It is the biggest peatland in the Cheshire lowlands, but this fact may not hold should plans for homes go ahead.

The Cheshire Wildlife Trust have written a robustly worded letter to Cheshire East Council's Director of Place - Jayne Traverse. Campaigners call the wording as 'remarkable'. 

The letter expresses concern at Cheshire East Council's public statements about the South Macclesfield Development Area. 

The letter accuses the council of making misleading statements and "apparent scientific inaccuracies and errors of fact" - in particular the claim that any development on Danes Moss could be done in a way that presents the SMDA "as a concept that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the site." 

As a campaign we agree completely with this letter and think it is frankly embarrassing for our council that the Wildlife Trust has had to point out basic scientific facts about peat and carbon emissions. In particular the statement, "Until CEC presents any such evidence to the contrary, it should be presumed that the SMDA will accelerate greenhouse gas emissions from the site."

The site is popular with dog walkers.

Also in Danes Moss news, SAVE DANES MOSS campaigners decided to publish the Carbon Status Report on the SMDA in its entirety. The Council have had this document since early December 2021 and still refuse to publish it. After obtaining this document we realised that the public need to know what the report says about the plan to build on Danes Moss - if the peat on site is disturbed and dries out it will release up to 220,000 tonnes of CO2 and other greenhouse gases. The council know that their plans will cause the peat to dry out and the reasons they give for not publishing this report are spurious. 

We consider it essential to publish this document in light of the comments of the Deputy Leader of the Council who stated on 20 July 2022 that the proposed development site on Danes Moss "has limited environmental and ecological benefit and there's been an independent assessment of that to confirm that it's the case" .

As far as we are aware this is completely untrue and misleading. We do not know which report Cllr Browne is referring to but the Carbon Status Report makes it clear that this site is of huge environmental significance. It is one of the biggest carbon stores in Cheshire. 

We are still waiting for the Strategic Planning Board (SPB) to consider the remaining 10 planning applications for the site. Our fundraiser has given us enough to begin a judicial review should any of these applications be approved. We are also ready to oppose any planning appeal by the developers if their planning applications are rejected by the SPB.

The campaign to save the site from development has crossed political parties. A sentiment echoed by Macclesfield South Cllr Fiona Wilson in this leaflet issued this weekend.

As well as the legal challenge, a Change.org petition entitled 'SAVE DANES MOSS' , to try and stop the housing plans, has 20,997 signatures as of publication of this article.

Read more about the proposals for the site here.

You can join the campaign against the development plans here, or donate to the crowdfunder here.

The full planning documents can be found here.

The site is thought to contain hundreds of thousands of tonnes of peat, which is a natural carbon sink, preventing it from being released into the atmosphere and contributing to climate change. (Image - Alexander Greensmith / Macclesfield Nub News)

This piece was Nubbed to Macclesfield Nub News by the Save Danes Moss campaign group. 

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