St Modwen has hit out at the Advertising Standards Authority after it upheld a complaint from a local MP over an advert for the developer’s planned Middle Quinton eco-town, near Stratford-upon-Avon.
Peter Luff MP had claimed that the advert for the developer made unsupported claims about housing, jobs and infrastructure.
The advert said that the “zero-carbon sustainable community” would create more than 4,700 jobs and 6,000 new homes. It also stated that Middle Quinton’s £100m investment in infrastructure would deliver Stratford’s western bypass.
The ASA upheld Luff’s complaint. It said that St Modwen, with its partner Stratford-based Bird Group, must not re-publish the advert in its current form and must not repeat the claims in the advert unless they had evidence to support them.
John Dodd, Midlands regional director at St Modwen, said: “The dispute with the ASA boils down to arguments over semantics but we believe we have acted with integrity and sought only to inform the public openly about our plans for the eco-town.”
He added: “The eco-town scheme is a long way off in development terms and should it be selected on the government’s final shortlist, it would still have to go through a rigorous planning process.
“Therefore, all we can do at such an early stage is to provide people with a firm concept for the scheme in terms of what we, as the developers, would like to build based on the facts that we have amassed to date.”
Dodd said the developers stood by the affirmations they made in their adverts.
