AREA B – HONOR OAK NATURE CORRIDOR LAND

Southwark has now begun to develop 1,022 burial plots on three acres of Honor Oak Nature Corridor next to Honor Oak Park Station – against massive objections from residents.

Area B The Old Plant Nursery site should be declared a Nature Reserve as part of the Honor Oak Nature Corridor because:

• It is Metropolitan Open Land in a Grade II SINC, home to hedgehogs, owls, bats, reptiles, butterflies, bees and many other rare and common species of wildlife
• This is rare inner city nature land that has never been used for burial
• Burial will lock up the use of this nature space forever, preventing any other public use
• 1,022 burial plots with rows of headstones on concrete plinths will provide just a few years of burial
• In Southwark’s 2016 Consultation, 86% of 454 respondents selected ‘I dislike it all’ and opposed any burial on this site
• Southwark’s application contradicts its own policy which recognises that biodiverse habitats are rare and valuable to Southwark residents and should be protected
• This land was promised for public community benefit, then swapped to ‘protect’ the Rec Ground which Southwark now refuses to guarantee
• The borough faces a 10% increase in population, all of whom will require access to more biodiverse green space not less
• Southwark residents are experiencing the same public health crises as other boroughs, including obesity and the impacts of deadly air pollution. The Council should be protecting and increasing natural wild places for residents’ mental and physical health and wellbeing
• Nature land is far too valuable to use for burial. A few years’ lawn burial plots followed by decades of sterility are no replacement for the beauty, tranquility and delight of nature
• Land is for the living. Our children need more wild green space to play in and learn and experience nature – not less