Tories and Lib Dems unite to stifle housing debate
By Zetetist on 7 February 2010, 16:53
This week’s prize for the most misleading newspaper headline must go to the West Briton for ‘Campaigners delighted as new homes plans are halted’. This refers to the plans to build either 11,100 or 9,400 houses in Camborne-Redruth. Councillor Biggs (Conservative, Camborne West) was quoted as saying the people of Camborne could now have a ‘real say’.
Really? Or is Councillor Biggs being disingenuous? And is the West Briton printing what is in effect a Conservative press release designed to conveniently shelve the issue of unsustainable housing and population growth until safely after the election?
On January 29th Cornwall Council’s Planning Policy Advisory Panel met and agreed to defer the current work on the Camborne-Redruth Area Action Plan (AAP) until more clarity was received about the Government’s top-down Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS). As I wrote here in advance of that meeting, the Council’s planners have been working on just two scenarios: either the Labour Government’s preferred plan of 11,100 houses for Camborne-Redruth as part of an overall 68,000 more houses in Cornwall by 2026 or the almost equally as bad 9,400 houses proposed by the old Kerrier District Council.
The Trelawney Alliance is more suspicious of the postponed work on the plan. And rightly so. Consult the Council’s paper on the Strategy consultation over the AAP back in June 2009. You’ll see how stubbornly determined the planners are to build at least 9,400 houses, three quarters of which are to accommodate in-migration.
That document also informs us that local builders Percy Williams and a London-based company called Elenday already own 13.5 hectares of the Tolgus ‘urban extension’ and are ‘well placed to take the lead in bringing forward this site for development at the earliest opportunity necessary’ [sic]. We also discover that the four most vigorous advocates of 11,100 new houses in the consultation were Elenday/Percy Williams, Poltair Homes and THF Ltd, Persimmon Homes Wessex and R.E.Philips and Partners.
Poltair Homes specialise in building ‘high quality family homes on prestigious developments’ and share a Greenbottom, Truro address with THF, which concentrates on affordable housing. Persimmon is a UK-wide builder with its headquarters at York. R.E. Philips are surveyors and property managers from Newport in Wales.
The majority of local people are opposed to this planned unsustainable level of population growth. These companies – all of whom will gain financially from more houses – are in favour of 11,100. The Tory-run Council appear to prefer 9,400. Neither Cllr Biggs nor local Tory parliamentary hopeful George Eustice (although condemning the targets for the umpteenth time as ‘crackpot’) nor Cllr Mike Clayton (Independent, Wendron) who was also quoted in the WB story, actually mention how many houses they would like to see built in Camborne-Redruth.
Trelawney Alliance reports Cornwall Council stating that we need ‘to establish what the real need for housing in the Camborne Pool Redruth Illogan area actually is’. By ‘we’ do they mean the planners and technical anoraks? Or are they encouraging a public debate about the kind of Cornwall we want? However, for the latter we must have some idea what level of housebuilding our elected and aspiring representatives at both local and parliamentary levels are proposing.
Despite several invitations to both Tory councillors and Lib Dem candidates to tell us exactly how many houses they think Cornwall in general and Camborne-Redruth in particular require we’ve had nothing but a deafening silence. I can only conclude that neither party is at all serious about encouraging a much-needed debate. Both will be equally relieved to see this issue kicked into the long grass until after May.
Really? Or is Councillor Biggs being disingenuous? And is the West Briton printing what is in effect a Conservative press release designed to conveniently shelve the issue of unsustainable housing and population growth until safely after the election?
On January 29th Cornwall Council’s Planning Policy Advisory Panel met and agreed to defer the current work on the Camborne-Redruth Area Action Plan (AAP) until more clarity was received about the Government’s top-down Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS). As I wrote here in advance of that meeting, the Council’s planners have been working on just two scenarios: either the Labour Government’s preferred plan of 11,100 houses for Camborne-Redruth as part of an overall 68,000 more houses in Cornwall by 2026 or the almost equally as bad 9,400 houses proposed by the old Kerrier District Council.
The Trelawney Alliance is more suspicious of the postponed work on the plan. And rightly so. Consult the Council’s paper on the Strategy consultation over the AAP back in June 2009. You’ll see how stubbornly determined the planners are to build at least 9,400 houses, three quarters of which are to accommodate in-migration.
That document also informs us that local builders Percy Williams and a London-based company called Elenday already own 13.5 hectares of the Tolgus ‘urban extension’ and are ‘well placed to take the lead in bringing forward this site for development at the earliest opportunity necessary’ [sic]. We also discover that the four most vigorous advocates of 11,100 new houses in the consultation were Elenday/Percy Williams, Poltair Homes and THF Ltd, Persimmon Homes Wessex and R.E.Philips and Partners.
Poltair Homes specialise in building ‘high quality family homes on prestigious developments’ and share a Greenbottom, Truro address with THF, which concentrates on affordable housing. Persimmon is a UK-wide builder with its headquarters at York. R.E. Philips are surveyors and property managers from Newport in Wales.
The majority of local people are opposed to this planned unsustainable level of population growth. These companies – all of whom will gain financially from more houses – are in favour of 11,100. The Tory-run Council appear to prefer 9,400. Neither Cllr Biggs nor local Tory parliamentary hopeful George Eustice (although condemning the targets for the umpteenth time as ‘crackpot’) nor Cllr Mike Clayton (Independent, Wendron) who was also quoted in the WB story, actually mention how many houses they would like to see built in Camborne-Redruth.
Trelawney Alliance reports Cornwall Council stating that we need ‘to establish what the real need for housing in the Camborne Pool Redruth Illogan area actually is’. By ‘we’ do they mean the planners and technical anoraks? Or are they encouraging a public debate about the kind of Cornwall we want? However, for the latter we must have some idea what level of housebuilding our elected and aspiring representatives at both local and parliamentary levels are proposing.
Despite several invitations to both Tory councillors and Lib Dem candidates to tell us exactly how many houses they think Cornwall in general and Camborne-Redruth in particular require we’ve had nothing but a deafening silence. I can only conclude that neither party is at all serious about encouraging a much-needed debate. Both will be equally relieved to see this issue kicked into the long grass until after May.
