Cotswold's 'flawed' 18,900 housing target opposed by 15 towns and villages
Summary
The Government’s “flawed” target to build almost 19,000 homes in the Cotswolds over the next two decades is opposed by more than a dozen towns and villages. A joint letter signed by 15 parish and town councils in the Cotswold district opposing the housing target has been sent to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG).
Details
Cotswold District Council is in the process of developing its new local plan which aims to meet the area’s new housing target. Their draft plan suggests 90 per cent of this new housing to be built in ten strategic sites outside the national landscape.
But the letters’ signatories believe the proposed housing plan is undeliverable due to incorrectly defined boundaries, flawed affordability metrics, and severe infrastructure constraints.
They believe the method used to calculate the Cotswold district’s housing requirement is “flawed” and will be “extremely damaging” to the local environment while “doing virtually nothing to alleviate the real problem of housing affordability for local people”.
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“We are particularly concerned about the attempt to re-allocate the housing requirement attributable to the roughly 50 per cent of the population living within the 80 per cent of the Cotswold National Landscape area,” the letter reads. They say new housing development is also constrained by flood risk, water/sewage infrastructure capacity and inadequate roads.
“We also suggest what needs to be done to enable the actual housing affordability issue here to be addressed in a sustainable way,” the letter continues. The councils are calling on the Government to take onboard their concerns and delay the creation of a new local plan until local government reorganisation takes place in the county.
Councillor Eileen Viviani, who chairs the planning and infrastructure committee at Moreton Town Council said it was an “unutual step” for the parish and town councils to have taken to make their case. But she explained they are “united in seeking ways to make their communities’ economic and housing needs heard, understood and met”.
Gloucestershire County Council will be merged with the six district authorities to create a new Gloucestershire Council in 2028. And the town and parish councils, who signed the letter, want the minister to agree that the application of the ‘standard formula’ for housing requirements is inappropriate for the Cotswold district in the meantime. MHCLG has been approached for comment.
Report source: Gloucestershire Live