A round up of recent activities and observations as we move into September. This is a copy of the article that we posted on our facebook group 'Save Billericay From Housing Developments'.
1. Basildon council continues to work towards a new public consultation on the Local Plan as requested by the Planning Inspector. We understand that this will primarily focus on new elements, plus new and revised evidence, that the council has brought forward since the plan was submitted in March 2019. We do not believe the consultation will allow further comment on the core plan as submitted over 2 years ago.
2. That said, we have long contested that residents have never had the opportunity to properly comment on the plans for south west Billericay where 1,700 houses across 4 large estates linked by a relief road are being proposed. Furthermore, some new Essex Highways analysis regarding the relief road has still not been completed and we feel that it should be subject to resident comment once it is made publicly available. We have therefore written directly to the Planning Inspector asking for consideration to be given to the proposals for this part of our town to be included in the new consultation. We await his response.
3. We, together with the Billericay District Residents’ Association, have had 2 meetings with the Leader of the Council and other local ward councillors. We wanted to reiterate our concerns with the Local Plan and to gauge whether they are of a mind to make any changes, now that they have regained control of the council, that might be beneficial to the residents of Billericay. No commitments were made but they confirmed that it was legally possible to introduce change after the Local Plan was submitted. It had previously been assumed that this was not possible. But don’t get too excited, it feels like getting the plan ‘as is’ in place is their primary concern. But we haven't given up our lobbying yet!
4. We have met with a Planning Consultant as part of our ongoing preparation for the examination in public which is now likely to take place early next year following the new consultation we mentioned above. We gained some important information that will help with our approach, together with access to another legal specialist who should enhance our position even more. We already have a transport specialist on board. We can’t go into this in much more detail just now but we will provide more once we get closer to the hearings.
5. The Basildon town centre regeneration has caused considerable interest recently with some planning applications for high rise mixed residential & retail blocks being approved, with others being rejected. We won’t go over all the detail again but our primary concern is that none of these plans will deliver any affordable housing and the cheapest units will require a first time buyer having at least a £41,000 salary for a typical mortgage purchase. Way above the local average wage and out of the reach of many key workers. Some of the units being proposed are only being made available for market rate rent with no purchase option. The reason we keep an eye on these non-Billericay matters is because the actions of the council and councillors when it comes to planning dictates what we are likely to see in the future should the Local Plan get adopted and we see a rush of planning applications. We will continue to call out anything we consider to be inappropriate.
6. The current Conservative council administration has written, via our three local Conservative MPs, to Robert Jenrick (Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government) asking for the housing target for Basildon to be capped at 15,465. On the face of it this looks positive. It’s not! That is the number in the submitted Local Plan that requires 500 hectares of Green Belt to be lost of which 150 hectares will deliver the 2,700 houses in and around Billericay. It changes nothing for us but if Jenrick agrees at least things can’t get any worse, for now. This is cold comfort and not worthy of applause. The council administration will no doubt contest that the number should be in excess in 20,000 using something called the standard method to determine house numbers. But as Jenrick himself has stated, that is not a hard target and local authorities can deliver a Local Plan with a lower number if local constraints to development exist. The Green Belt is such a valid constraint. Someone isn’t listening to the Minister, or has misinterpreted his words. Or perhaps it suits them to ignore him!
7. We are active members of the Community Planning Alliance which is a national organisation representing the interests of the hundreds of similar groups fighting inappropriate local planning matters. The sad fact is that we are all in the same boat facing excessive house numbers, infrastructure concerns, loss of valuable and sensitive environments but above all feeling like no one is listening to our concerns, especially councillors and councils. The root issue is the 300,000+ a year housing target the Government has set which has no credible basis. It won’t deliver the right houses in the right places and it certainly will not address the challenge of housing affordability. It’s an arbitrary number, probably double the true need, and it makes you wonder where it came from. Any guesses which industry has one of the strongest lobby groups in Parliament?! That said we are pleased to see the House of Lords looking into the housing numbers as projections show that only 150,000 are needed each year as opposed to the Government’s unjustifiable 300,000.
8. A new version of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) has just been released. It states that local authorities should consider a 50 year vision from the date of Local Plan adoption where “significant extensions to existing villages and towns form part of the strategy for the area”. This applies to Billericay and other parts of the borough. But the emerging Local Plan covers the period to 2034 and possibly won’t be adopted until 2023. That suggests just an 11 year vision that is way out of line with the strategic policies in the NPPF. Worst still when you consider that much of the underpinning evidence and methodology used to create and justify the Basildon Local Plan goes back to 2011-2016. It’s out of date now, and will be if and when adopted, and it’s vision is short-sighted. We will be raising this with the Planning Inspector as he too should be informed by the NPPF in his decision making.
9. The NPPF is not only used to help shape new Local Plans. It is also used by council planning officers to inform and shape their recommendations on day to day planning applications. One aspect of the revised NPPF is that it gives some weight to ‘beauty’ and that has already been used to decide a local planning application. But how do you legally apply something as subjective, and in many ways personal, as beauty? But this appears to be at odds with other parts of the planning system that allow permitted development rights where the council has very limited reasons for objecting. And being ugly isn’t one of them. If the Government’s planning reforms go ahead huge estates will get permitted development rights and being able to ensure that they are beautiful will get even harder.
10. The Government has announced details of a (new?) funding scheme for affordable housing. We are trying to determine if Basildon council has secured any of this money. It’s interesting to note that there is a clear and perhaps enhanced focus on new properties to rent. Is this a realisation that high houses prices, that are showing no signs of coming down, are here to stay? Is the Government subtly backing away from its promise of people owning a home of their own and that renting is the inevitable future? Time will tell but we are watching this carefully as housing affordability is the real issue, not house availability. We plan to look at affordability again very soon in a new article.
The net of all this is that the world of housing planning and provision is continually changing, the Local Plan is still not decided and we wait for Basildon Council to hold yet another consultation before the Planning Inspector can start his hearings. More patience will be needed for what will be the 9th year of this debacle!
1. Basildon council continues to work towards a new public consultation on the Local Plan as requested by the Planning Inspector. We understand that this will primarily focus on new elements, plus new and revised evidence, that the council has brought forward since the plan was submitted in March 2019. We do not believe the consultation will allow further comment on the core plan as submitted over 2 years ago.
2. That said, we have long contested that residents have never had the opportunity to properly comment on the plans for south west Billericay where 1,700 houses across 4 large estates linked by a relief road are being proposed. Furthermore, some new Essex Highways analysis regarding the relief road has still not been completed and we feel that it should be subject to resident comment once it is made publicly available. We have therefore written directly to the Planning Inspector asking for consideration to be given to the proposals for this part of our town to be included in the new consultation. We await his response.
3. We, together with the Billericay District Residents’ Association, have had 2 meetings with the Leader of the Council and other local ward councillors. We wanted to reiterate our concerns with the Local Plan and to gauge whether they are of a mind to make any changes, now that they have regained control of the council, that might be beneficial to the residents of Billericay. No commitments were made but they confirmed that it was legally possible to introduce change after the Local Plan was submitted. It had previously been assumed that this was not possible. But don’t get too excited, it feels like getting the plan ‘as is’ in place is their primary concern. But we haven't given up our lobbying yet!
4. We have met with a Planning Consultant as part of our ongoing preparation for the examination in public which is now likely to take place early next year following the new consultation we mentioned above. We gained some important information that will help with our approach, together with access to another legal specialist who should enhance our position even more. We already have a transport specialist on board. We can’t go into this in much more detail just now but we will provide more once we get closer to the hearings.
5. The Basildon town centre regeneration has caused considerable interest recently with some planning applications for high rise mixed residential & retail blocks being approved, with others being rejected. We won’t go over all the detail again but our primary concern is that none of these plans will deliver any affordable housing and the cheapest units will require a first time buyer having at least a £41,000 salary for a typical mortgage purchase. Way above the local average wage and out of the reach of many key workers. Some of the units being proposed are only being made available for market rate rent with no purchase option. The reason we keep an eye on these non-Billericay matters is because the actions of the council and councillors when it comes to planning dictates what we are likely to see in the future should the Local Plan get adopted and we see a rush of planning applications. We will continue to call out anything we consider to be inappropriate.
6. The current Conservative council administration has written, via our three local Conservative MPs, to Robert Jenrick (Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government) asking for the housing target for Basildon to be capped at 15,465. On the face of it this looks positive. It’s not! That is the number in the submitted Local Plan that requires 500 hectares of Green Belt to be lost of which 150 hectares will deliver the 2,700 houses in and around Billericay. It changes nothing for us but if Jenrick agrees at least things can’t get any worse, for now. This is cold comfort and not worthy of applause. The council administration will no doubt contest that the number should be in excess in 20,000 using something called the standard method to determine house numbers. But as Jenrick himself has stated, that is not a hard target and local authorities can deliver a Local Plan with a lower number if local constraints to development exist. The Green Belt is such a valid constraint. Someone isn’t listening to the Minister, or has misinterpreted his words. Or perhaps it suits them to ignore him!
7. We are active members of the Community Planning Alliance which is a national organisation representing the interests of the hundreds of similar groups fighting inappropriate local planning matters. The sad fact is that we are all in the same boat facing excessive house numbers, infrastructure concerns, loss of valuable and sensitive environments but above all feeling like no one is listening to our concerns, especially councillors and councils. The root issue is the 300,000+ a year housing target the Government has set which has no credible basis. It won’t deliver the right houses in the right places and it certainly will not address the challenge of housing affordability. It’s an arbitrary number, probably double the true need, and it makes you wonder where it came from. Any guesses which industry has one of the strongest lobby groups in Parliament?! That said we are pleased to see the House of Lords looking into the housing numbers as projections show that only 150,000 are needed each year as opposed to the Government’s unjustifiable 300,000.
8. A new version of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) has just been released. It states that local authorities should consider a 50 year vision from the date of Local Plan adoption where “significant extensions to existing villages and towns form part of the strategy for the area”. This applies to Billericay and other parts of the borough. But the emerging Local Plan covers the period to 2034 and possibly won’t be adopted until 2023. That suggests just an 11 year vision that is way out of line with the strategic policies in the NPPF. Worst still when you consider that much of the underpinning evidence and methodology used to create and justify the Basildon Local Plan goes back to 2011-2016. It’s out of date now, and will be if and when adopted, and it’s vision is short-sighted. We will be raising this with the Planning Inspector as he too should be informed by the NPPF in his decision making.
9. The NPPF is not only used to help shape new Local Plans. It is also used by council planning officers to inform and shape their recommendations on day to day planning applications. One aspect of the revised NPPF is that it gives some weight to ‘beauty’ and that has already been used to decide a local planning application. But how do you legally apply something as subjective, and in many ways personal, as beauty? But this appears to be at odds with other parts of the planning system that allow permitted development rights where the council has very limited reasons for objecting. And being ugly isn’t one of them. If the Government’s planning reforms go ahead huge estates will get permitted development rights and being able to ensure that they are beautiful will get even harder.
10. The Government has announced details of a (new?) funding scheme for affordable housing. We are trying to determine if Basildon council has secured any of this money. It’s interesting to note that there is a clear and perhaps enhanced focus on new properties to rent. Is this a realisation that high houses prices, that are showing no signs of coming down, are here to stay? Is the Government subtly backing away from its promise of people owning a home of their own and that renting is the inevitable future? Time will tell but we are watching this carefully as housing affordability is the real issue, not house availability. We plan to look at affordability again very soon in a new article.
The net of all this is that the world of housing planning and provision is continually changing, the Local Plan is still not decided and we wait for Basildon Council to hold yet another consultation before the Planning Inspector can start his hearings. More patience will be needed for what will be the 9th year of this debacle!
