SIR — EDF (Electricity de France), a French Government owned utility, has the government contract to build the new Hinkley Point nuclear power station.

It alone has put forward proposals to build hostels with car parks and other facilities for 200 workers here in Williton on one of two chosen sites.

So far as I can ascertain, no one has yet been asked to comment.

However, there are locally produced leaflets dropping through our doors claiming that "this cannot be prevented" and the only course of action is for the two sides of Williton to scrabble in order to ensure that the other site is chosen.

Pamphlets nailed to lamp posts exhort us to save the east site (Catwell) at all costs. What the residents of North Street, North Road and Shutgate Meadow etc. might think of this is not addressed.

This is not the time for the people of Williton to tear themselves apart but to join together to reject the scheme outright. 

How can the provision of a temporary hostel for 200 men, probably lasting eight years and with all the attendant problems, benefit Williton? 

Why should our representatives entertain the massive increase in daily traffic created for the already overcrowded and dangerous A39?  

Surely additional workers brought in from outside should be accommodated on, or near, the site.

According to Andrew Goodchild, the planning manager for West Somerset Council, no decision has yet been taken by the council and its first consideration of the EDF proposal will be at a meeting in January.

The first point at which we can view the plans in detail will be at Danesfield School on December 5 between 10am and 4pm and further more direct consultations are planned between March and May next year.   

Additionally, clearance for the power station will not be given by the HSE until June 2011.

We have yet to hear how the parish council proposes to represent the views of everyone in Williton but its task will be much more difficult if it is dealing with a divided village.

There is so much we can do and time to do it.

Write to EDF with your views and copy them to the planning department of the district council.

I understand that "Freepost, Consultation Process" is all that is needed for you opinion to reach EDF but I would suggest that informing our representatives through the planning department is much more important.

Together we can prevent Williton becoming unrecognisable in the future, so do not be panicked into creating a villager against villager situation.

Ken Cordingley,

Catwell, Williton.