The proposed planning reforms will affect us all

The Chesham and Amersham by-election win for the Liberal Democrats was no fluke. Several members of the Brixworth Focus team went to Chesham on the Sunday before the election and it was evident to us that residents are extremely concerned about the governments planning reform agenda.  In our area,  we should be too!

These swathing and ill thought through changes favour only the developers.  It is no coincidence that it has been labelled a ‘developers charter’.  These changes would bring a zoning system which is effectively determined at central government level with little or no local involvement or influence on these.   The major change would be that planning is effectively granted at the point of adopting a local plan which will have, at most, two stages of consultation, imposing national design codes, giving non-negotiable housing numbers to build,  all of which will take away the ability of local people to have a say at each stage of developments in their area.

A further area of proposed change would remove the need for developers to build affordable homes on developments of less than 50 homes and remove their requirement for what is called Section 106 Funding which is effectively a contribution made by developers back to local communities to meet their needs to further enhance and improve services and the environment for residents.  

The majority of developers make their money from building Executive homes and are not interested in building affordable homes – the very type of homes that the country is crying out for.

The newly adopted Corporate plan for West Northamptonshire refers to the fact that ‘We sit in the middle of the Oxford – Milton Keynes – Cambridge Arc and will use its development as an opportunity to actively drive growth, seek investment and progress infrastructure development’.

Just take a look at the government website on the Oxford-Cambridge Arc and it is evident what it means:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/oxford-cambridge-arc

Furthermore,  the council earns 22.7% of its come from council tax and 7.3% from business rates so you can see the growth opportunity that could easily be exploited under the banner of Johnson’s build, build, build programme.

Finally, there is surely no coincidence that developers donated £891,000 to the Conservative party in the first three months of 2021 alone.  The rock band Dire Straights had a hit back in the 1980’s called “Money For Nothing”.  I’m pretty sure that this wouldn’t apply in this instance.

   1 Comment