NIMBYISM it's not - just plain sense.

A Parliamentary petition organised by the Canvey Independent Party pleads for no further houses on Canvey until the island gets a third access road.

The case is so overwhelming as to be unanswerable, at least for anyone living on or near Canvey, where the access problems are a nightmare affecting everyone living, working and trading on the island.

The knock-on effect of these traffic jams is frequently exported right across south Essex.

Into this quagmire, the regional structure plan demands the injection of 4,000 new houses.

It isn't so much the homes themselves to which the petition objects, as the lack of infrastructure to support them.

In this sense, Canvey is a microcosm of the follies of south Essex planning as a whole, where tens of thousands of new homes are cheerfully proposed, without any new roads.

It has long been clear those responsible for this recipe for gridlock are detached from reality.

They should live on Canvey a few weeks.

It wouldn't be long before they'd be queuing to sign the petition themselves.