Hugo Swire s initiative aimed at creating an academy at Rolle as a Hospitality Skills College is a welcome move. If it succeeds, it will bring in the full-time, higher education students we lost two years ago and will have spin-off benefits by raising the

Hugo Swire's initiative aimed at creating an academy at Rolle as a Hospitality Skills College is a welcome move. If it succeeds, it will bring in the full-time, higher education students we lost two years ago and will have spin-off benefits by raising the quality of the town's services for tourists. Ideally, one of the sites vacated by Rolle looking out to sea from Douglas Avenue would become a four-star teaching hotel linked to the new college.

The announcement came as no surprise to the Starter Group, which is working to secure Rolle for the community and for education as part of Exmouth's regeneration programme, as Hugo Swire explained his idea at our recent community engagement event and has kept us informed about progress. We are supporting it on the understanding that we will be pressing ahead with our own proposals in order to avoid putting all our eggs in one basket.

We have prepared a planning design brief for the whole site, which will be considered at the East Devon District Council executive meeting on March 3 and our substantial business plan is almost ready. We have identified 10 action areas to underpin our preparations, with a task group for each, and we are in the process of establishing a social enterprise company to manage the project.

In the event that the Hospitality College is to be established, we shall wish to engage in discussions about how this would fit with the wider post-16 training needs of Exmouth and the locality.

Once again Exmouth has the chance to move forward, despite the economic climate.

Roy Pryke,

Chairman, Rolle Starter Group.