Cheltenham MP Martin Horwood was speaking at the planning inquiry into development of green space near Leckhampton. He has released his detailed submission to the South West Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS) he made before the deadline for the consultation on the final stage of the RSS - the Secretary of State’s proposed changes to the draft RSS - closed on 24 October 2008.
The Regional Spatial Strategy was originally drawn up on behalf of the government by the South West Regional Assembly, a body made up of local councillors from across the south west of England and some appointed representatives. After years of consultation, their final draft RSS included 8,500 houses for Cheltenham borough and a total 12,500 for Cheltenham and neighbouring areas of green space in Tewkesbury borough. 4,000 were specifically earmarked for an urban extension to the north-west of Cheltenham.
The draft RSS was then subjected to an ‘Examination in Public’ by three government inspectors. The panel of inspectors made their recommendations in December 2007. They reduced the number of houses for Cheltenham borough to 8,100 but increased the total for Cheltenham and neighbouring areas in Tewkesbury borough to 13,800, sharply increasing the pressure on green field sites. The north-west urban extension was increased to 5,000 and a new urban extension to the south of Cheltenham next to Leckhampton was identified for 1,300 homes.
In his sumbission Martin Horwood spelled out why the Secretary of State was weakening the environmental policies in the RSS and why the urban extensions to the north and south of Cheltenham should not go ahead.
“The 360 homes being debated at this week’s inquiry are just the tip of the iceberg. The RSS earmarks more than a thousand for this area and five thousand more for the north of Cheltenham next to Swindon village. We have to fight these proposals tooth and nail.
We’re not NIMBYs. All parties locally have accepted 8,000 houses over twenty years for the urban area of Cheltenham. That’s a huge amount of new housing. But we absolutely draw the line at nearly 14,000 which is what is now proposed and would certainly mean development spoiling out over much loved and valued countryside next to Leckhampton, Hatherley and Swindon Village.
The threat to Leckhampton is personally very important to me. I live in Leckhampton, my children go to school along the roads that all these new cars would have to use and my father spent the last years of his life campaigning with the Leckhampton Green Land Action Group [Leglag] to save these fields. I’d be letting down his memory if I didn’t do everything in my power to try to stop the developers. And I know that the green fields to the north of Cheltenham matter every bit as much to people living there.”
In my submission to the RSS I’ve tried to spell out in detail how sustainability criteria are weakened in the proposed changes by the Secretary of State, why the policy of urban extensions is misguided and why the housing market and economic downturn now mean the government’s housing number projections are now hopelessly out of date. I’ve also criticised the two urban extensions to Cheltenham in a lot of detail.”
The Secretary of State’s final announcements are expected late this year or early next year.
You can read the Martin's response to RSS proposed changes in full here.
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