There isn’t as much news to report as usual, which I suspect is because we are getting close to the summer break. I’ll carry on doing the newsletter until the end of July but, as usual, there won’t be any during August unless something important occurs. If anyone gets withdrawal symptom’s you will hopefully be able to hear me on Radio Nottingham in August as part of their Olympic Coverage when I take my family down to London to see some of the athletics.
1. Midland Mainline
There are strong rumours circulating that the coalition government is to announce tomorrow that they will be funding the electrification of the Midland Mainline. This will be extremely good news if it is true. It will mean that we have faster and cleaner trains, and the investment will generate significant job opportunities as well.
2. Weeds on Paths and Verges
In April this year responsibility for looking after the footpaths and verges passed from the borough council to the county council. They have informed us this week that they are now five weeks behind with their programme of cutting paths and verges. This is why so many areas look overgrown. I am one of a number of councillors who have complained about this, but the county council have told us that they will not make any alterations to their order for doing things to address the worst areas.
3. Housing Numbers in Broxtowe
As many people will know Broxtowe Borough Council is currently putting together a new local plan, which identifies that 6,150 houses will be needed over the next 15 years to cope with the growth in population in Broxtowe. This is currently out for consultation. However I was able to announce at the council meeting on Tuesday that some new research has been published which suggests that the level of demand across Greater Nottingham may have been over-estimated by about 5,000 homes, and if this is confirmed then I will be arguing strongly that Broxtowe should take the largest share of this reduction, given that we have the highest density and the lowest amount of available land.
If you live in or around Kimberley there is a public meeting on Tuesday evening for residents to discuss the councils plans. It takes place at Kimberley Parish Hall at 7.00pm.
Finally on this topic there was a debate in parliament about Broxtowe’s housing strategy on Friday, organised by Anna Soubry. Needless to say this was not something that interested many other MP’s and there were only about three people in the chamber, and poor Anna was rather sent away with a flea in her ear by the Minister of State.
4. Planning Application in Toton
Following on from the last item Peverill Homes have announced that they are submitting a planning application to build 775 houses on green belt land, between the top of Toton and the bottom of Stapleford. The council have previously indicated that we would not support development here and so it is unlikely that planning permission would be granted. The developers are aware of this and must be hoping that the Secretary of State will override local wishes and grant planning permission.
5. Temporary Police Station
The police have created a temporary police station based at Inham Nook Community Centre during July and August. This is in response to a problem with burglaries in thhe area and will mean that the police will be based nearer to enable them to respond more quickly and to increase the number of patrols that they have in the area.
6. Sainsbury’s Charity Vote
Sainsbury’s in Beeston have recently run a vote amongst customers to select the charity they were to fund next year. The winner is the cancer suffers hospice at City Hospital.
7. More Cyclists
An interesting statistic this week was that there has been a 10% increase on cyclists using cycling paths on the county over the past twelve months. There will no doubt me many reasons for this but I hope that the investment that the borough council has put into cycle paths and facilities will be a part of it.
8. Police Priorities
Police officers coving Toton, Chilwell and Attenborough are holding an open meeting to set their priorities for the next three months. The meeting takes place at Banks Road School on Wednesday at 7pm.
9. Kimberley Blood Donors
People are being urged to give blood in Kimberley on July 26. Donor sessions will take place 1pm to 3.15pm and 4.45pm to 7.30pm at Kimbrley Leisure Centre and anyone aged between 17 – 65, weighing more than 50 kg, or seven stone 12lbs and in general good health can become a blood donor. To book an appointment call the Donor Line on 0300 123 23 23 or visit www.blood.co.uk.
As ever thank you for your support for this newsletter, and any feedback is gratefully received.
Best wishes
David
2.Weeds on Paths and Verges
Surely though that places where there is clearly a health & safety issue they must act on that firstly, for example the top of Hickings Lane here in Stapleford, where the hedge has grown over the path and onto the road ( a picture can be found on http://www.staplefordcommunitygroup.org.uk ).
3.Housing Numbers in Broxtowe
So, if this is true, then the GreenBelt Field Farm should be the first place taken out of the Core Strategy as clearly it should not heve been included in the first place. The council MUST remove any GreenBelt before any other places.
This would have been a good message if you had not ruined it by including the following,
“Finally on this topic there was a debate in parliament about Broxtowe’s
housing strategy on Friday, organised by Anna Soubry. Needless to say this was not something that interested many other MP’s and there were only about three people in the chamber, and poor Anna was rather sent away with a flea in her ear by the Minister of State.”
There is no need what so ever to take another dig at our MP. She is one of the only people who is actually listening to the residents of all areas of Broxtowe. People should put politics aside and actually realise that you should be working together, listening to the people who vote for you and not allowing any building on any Green Belt. As I have said before, here in Stapleford we have been let down, let down by all our County Councillors, Borough Councillors and several Stapleford Town Councillors who have not organised any consultation meetings with the public that only talk about the Broxtowe Core Strategy. ( Again CAT meetings are not good enough). WE HAVE BEEN LET DOWN.
The Council have let people down as they didn’t make sure every house received a leaflet explaining about how to object to the Core Strategy. People from all parts of Broxtowe have not received the leaflet. I have heard people from Greasley, Toton, Bramcote and Stapleford to name a few (and I imagine Kimberley is the same) who have not had the leaflet delivered or even seen it.
I thought the debate on Friday was very positive and despite the lack of people in the chamber (as it always is on a Friday afternoon) the Minister was there and that’s who mattered. I don’t know where you get the “flea in the ear” from as the minister gave a very positive reply. So I think the debate went well and again MP Anna Soubry was doing what the residents of Broxtowe wanted and that’s representing us. Which is more than can be said for certain Councillors.
3. Housing Numbers in Broxtowe.
I totally agree with Richard’s comments, and am pleased the figure may be reduced. If it is, then Field Farm and any other Green Belt should be removed immediately from the core strategy.
How strongly you will argue this is another matter seeing as it is you who is leading the campaign to build on Green Belt and urged your fellow councillors to vote yes on it at the Council meeting. I know your argument is that there are not enough Brownfield sites within the borough and the council have supposedly spent days researching every site, but have never released a list of these sites to the public, so how do we know. The core strategy does not show any of these sites. Does it include the Bartons site at Chilwell, the railway sidings just as you enter Trowell from Ilkeston, even the now defunct Golf course off Thoresby Road?
In principal if you allow building on Field Farm, an important wildlife corridor, then you have no excuse to stop developers building all the way up Coventry Lane, Trowell Moor and through Bilborough and Strelley. Is this what you and the rest of the Lib Dem and Labour Councillors really want? Is it the money this will bring in that is so important? What is the hidden agenda that you have to ignore the electorate?
If the housing number is reduced, will this just affect Rushcliffe as they seemed to have rightfully ignored the target and just done their own thing and slashed the number of required houses in their borough?
To make matters even worse for the residents of Stapleford and anyone using the A52, Erewash have produced their Core Strategy and plan to build 2000 houses at Stanton, closing Lows Lane off altogether, thus forcing the traffic through Stapleford.
Come on Mr Watts, push politics aside and support the residents of this borough. At least our MP is listening and supporting us and doing a good job.
Perhaps you should be interested in this comment on ‘InsideHousing.co.uk which has been sent to me, proving that at least some councils are actually discussing housing with their voters:
‘The scrapping of regional plans has been ‘good news’, Mr Rigg adds: “It allows North Hertfordshire and other local authorities to plan their housing according to their needs and in discussion with their electorates, rather than having central government impose housing targets on areas where perhaps discussion hadn’t taken place.”
The Graveley protestors wish to keep some green space between themselves and Stevenage, and the shift towards localism appears to mean they are now more likely to do so.’
Rick – Richard is coming to my place on Friday afternoon to view the maps of all the sites that we have looked at – the list that you (completely wrongly) claim that we have never published. You are welcome to see these as well, as is anyone else who is interested. I am not leading any fight to build on the green belt, but we have to have a sound core strategy which provides sufficient housing to meet local need – this is the bit that Anna ignores in her campaign. She may be listening to local people but she is not being straight with people. If we can’t provide sufficient homes to meet need then the plan will be unsound and we really will then be faced with developers building all over our green belt. By sacrificing a small bit of green belt now we protect the rest of it. I know that this is not a popular message if you happen to live where that bit is but what I am trying to do is to protect the vast majority of green belt land that we have.
In answer to your questions we are hoping to include an allowance of 250 homes at the Barton site but that is something I’m discussing with Mr Barton at the moment, we have included the land at Trowell but we have not included anything for Bramcote Hills golf course as that is a protected open space (there have been a number of discussions on here about that previously). I don’t support any building on the golf course.
I really don’t know why people are buying the lie that councillors (of any party) have some sort of hidden agenda. We are all local residents who all want the best for our communities. To take your specific example, my house backs onto Coventry Lane and so why would I ever support any policies which might in reality risk people building on the area that you refer to? Common sense should tell you that I won’t.
If you read Inside Housing you hopefully saw the report this week of Hull’s core strategy being found to be unsound by the inspectors. They were the first authority to be in this position, but it means that the warnings I have been sounding about this are no longer just a theoretical possibility but the reality for other authorities.
What I can promise everyone, and I give my word on this, is that as long as I hold the brief on planning I will never support one house on the green belt that does not need to be there.
As far as the claims about inadequate distribution of the publicity material are concerned I’ve asked people to give me specifics about where these areas are. So far I have been met with a wall of silence as an answer. If people do let me know of apparently missed areas I will investigate, but I suspect that the answer in many areas will be that people have thrown the leaflets away without reading them. However if I’m given details of missing streets I’ll look into it.
As far as my comments about Anna being sent away with a flea in her ear are concerned, Anna wanted the Minister to criticise Broxtowe’s approach which he pointedly refused to do. I’d love to be working with Anna on this and I’m sure that if there had been a spirit of co-operation rather than confrontation then everyone would have benefited, but the problem in that regard has come from her end. Anna has refused to ever acknowledge that the council has legal duties to comply with. I’ve met with Anna to discuss this privately, and last time I debated the matter with her on the radio she denied that the meeting had ever taken place. I’m afraid she is saying what people want to hear rather than being honest with residents. I don’t expect to always agree with my MP (of any party) but I do expect them to be honest with people. At the moment I don’t feel that I could be confident that Anna would do that with residents.
As I said at the start, I’m willing to meet with any community groups or individuals to discuss the duties and opportunities facing the council, and if anyone has a workable suggestion for how to meet our duties which is better than ours then I will happily take it on board. If you want to meet to discuss matters let me know. David
“By sacrificing a small bit of green belt now we protect the rest of it.”
I’m sure there was a similar statement made when the Trowell Park Drive housing estate was developed on greenbelt land many years ago.
Therefore the statement lacks credibility David.
David. Sorry you had to canceI Friday, however I just don’t get it. Why do people have to come round to your house to see maps and info on the brownfield sites Broxtowe Borough Council (BBC) have inspected. Why are they not on display in public libraries and displayed for all to see. Bramcote Conservation Society have a map with all the Green Belt Sites on with site info, which they put together and had printed. Surely with all the resources BBC have it isn’t too much to ask. Then we can all see if the sites will not make the sufficient housing number without building on Greenbelt.
Might I also add you are not sacrificing a small amount of Greenbelt, but whole chunks of it throughout the borough, Field Farm, Toton and Greasley to name but a few.
As for your promise you will never support one house on the green belt that does not need to be there, well prove it and remove Field Farm from the Core Strategy. Because Westermans failed to keep farming this land it has now turned itself into a kind of nature reserve which in my opinion it should stay as this, or even be developed more down this route. These fields once produced food and would have carried on doing so if Westermans had had a bit of forethought.
The council do not have to accept this ludicrously high figure of 6,150 new homes in this already overcrowded borough, especially now new and up to date growth figures have now been produced.
Also in the recent news was a flooding problem on the Trowell Park Estate. Will covering Field Farm in concrete make this problem worse… more than likely. Your legal duty is surely to your electorate and not just giving in to what the planners think. Have you actually read the Core Strategy? I have, and once you get around the endless pages of planning speak put there to confuse us, it become a totally contradictory document, innaccurate, out of date and presents all the problems people have been complaining about and yet does not offer any solutions. Like I think it was Mr Dance said at a CAT meeting, ‘yes there will be a traffic problem, but there is not much we can do about that ‘. Great.
Now regarding the Barton’s site. I am glad you are having meetings about this, but am appalled it has not been put in the Strategy as a potential large site. I also can’t figure out why the Council should not investigate all sites, potential and otherwise, and build on these before setting foot on any Greenbelt. Afterall this is supposed to be a plan looking at the next 15 years. It seems to me you are just taking the easy option, to make quick easy income, never mind infrastructure, biodiversity, coalescence, flood risks, peoples feelings. Building on Field Farm or any Greenbelt land is a travesty and you and this Council will go down in local history as supporting it and turning Broxtowe into one massive housing estate. Hope you are feeling proud of yourself.
Rick
I am very proud to have done my best for the people of Bramcote, and of Broxtowe, for the 13 years that I have been a councillor. Like every Broxtowe Councillor of every party I want the best for my borough. I am a local resident and want Broxtowe to be the jewel in the crown of Nottinghamshire.
The population of the UK is increasing. The population of Nottinghamshire is increasing. The population of Broxtowe is increasing. These are facts that cannot be avoided. More people inevitably means more homes. I do not want a situation where we have mass homelessness or Victorian slums reappearing in the borough. I doubt that you do either. Therefore we must provide homes for people to live in. Every time a local plan is devised for the area the council has done this, whether Tory, Labour or partnership controlled. This time round is no different. Population experts tell us that the population of the UK is expected to peak at about 2050 and then start a gradual decline after that, and so it is possible that the same may have to happen again in 15 years time,
The law in this country is generally that people can build anywhere unless there is a rule saying that they can’t. What the local plan process does is puts limits on this so that there are constraints about where people can build and how much they can. The 6,150 figure that you mention is not a target but a limit on new housing.
If you have read the core strategy, as you claim, then you will be aware that all authorities have to have a five year supply of building land available. That is why we cannot lawfully have an approach of brownfield first before any greenbelt. Some major brownfield sites just will not be available within the next five years (Boots for instance, where we want to build probably in excess of five hundred houses). Broxtowe does not at this time have a five year supply of land available.
The housing figure is based on calculated need over the next 15 years, but as I have made clear repeatedly if we can get that down then we will. Recently the new projections figures that I spoke about at the council last week and the census returns may have provided us with evidence to do that, as the need is likely to be less than previously assessed. This is something that the council will review in the autumn before proceeding any further with the local plan process.
We have not put forward any green belt land in Toton or Greasley for development. The only sites that we have identified in the core strategy are at Field Farm and at Boots. The council accepted a Lib-Dem proposal that the next stage of the process, actually identifying sites, should be done by way of what are called neighbourhood plans, where local communities decide about development in their areas, rather than the council do it. I was pleased to see that Anna Soubry was advocating this approach at a meeting this week in Kimberley, although she did seem to have misunderstood the timing of these and she was unaware that the Tories at the borough council all voted against these, against letting local people dictate what happens in their own areas.
The Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment, which records all the possible sites that the council has looked at, is available for people to see as it is a background paper to the core strategy. I would imagine that they are in the libraries, although I cannot promise this. I however have a copy of them and am happy to show them to people as a way of aiding their understanding.
The core strategy talks about infrastructure and services, as well as houses, and makes it clear that these need to be provided as well to ensure that the area goes forward. I have no wish to see gridlock any more than anyone else does, and all councillors will look at the impact of development before granting planning permission for them. The options about infrastructure though are that we have a plan for development or that we proceed in a haphazard and unplanned way, which would result in chaos.
David
It seems to me that many people are swept up by rumours and NIMBY’ism and do not listen to what David Watts and other Councillors have to say. Unfortunately the most vociforous of our Councillors is David and I would like to see more from his colleagues in support. It is interesting that it seems our MP has differing views to the Conservative Councillors but I for one am prepared to accept David’s version as it seems that this can be the only way forward and in no way is a commitment to wholesale destruction of the Broxtowe environment.
It is interesting that Hull core strategy was found to be unsound- surely none of us want our Borough to have such a verdict as a black mark against us?
“The population of the UK is increasing. The population of Nottinghamshire is increasing. The population of Broxtowe is increasing. These are facts that cannot be avoided.”
David – incorrect – the population is the ‘elephant in the room’ that nobody seems to want to address. The population DOES NOT need to increase. Our NHS cannot cope, our transport infrastructure struggles massively and on a daily basis, jobs are scarce… need I go on?
Why doesn’t someone challenge this increasing population, regionally nationally and, for that matter, internationally.?
Thank you Peter – it’s good to know that I am not the complete incarnation of Lucifer in everyone’s eyes. I think to be fair to my colleagues that as I’m the portfolio holder for planning they feel that it is appropriate for me to take the lead on this.
And we are still all waiting for Cllr Steve Barber to come back with some kind of proof, some kind of information he was going to supply us and tell us why our MP is wrong. Wasn’t the last thing he said he knows she is wrong because he knows. How long must we wait???????????
Kevin – The population is rising because families are getting bigger. Whilst we have had record numbers of immigrants over the past 15 years we are also in something of a baby boom. A preliminary reading of the census information suggests that even if we cut ourselves off from the rest of the world we would still have a rising population. As a small local council we couldn’t change the law on immigration, and so it would do us no good to say that we don’t agree with the level of immigration. We have to deal with the growth that is occurring from any source and the consequences that come from it. On the other hand you might have been advocating compulsory sterilisation or euthanasia but I wouldn’t support you on either of them.
“Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalise, ignore and even deny anything that doesn’t fit in with the core belief.”
I agree with you there Richard. Sadly there are people who do this and later have had to apologise for being wrong. Our MP (to her credit) being one of them following the incident to which you alluded on 21 July.