“At tonight’s meeting of the Cabinet we will not be formally agreeing the start of a consultation on a Local Plan draft that includes 17,000 new homes.
“Since the unanimous vote to reject this housing number, created by the ‘standard method’, Cabinet members have been working hard with council officers on a plan to successfully develop a new sustainable number of new homes.
“I believe everyone is in agreement that the trend over the last 60 years of extreme housing growth in Basingstoke and Deane needs to slow down in order for local services to catch up and create a much more sustainable future for the borough.
“The council has been working towards updating its Local Plan to ensure an approach to the future which meets the needs of our residents and visitors in a way that responds to the climate change agenda, ensures that communities thrive and are sustainable and our precious environment is protected. Any one of these would have challenges but delivering on all of them in the current planning system is a significant challenge. Commentators who suggest otherwise are in denial over the complexities of the system.
“I would like to thank the parish and town councils, visiting speakers and the councillors on our local Economic, Planning and Housing Committee for all their hard work discussing and providing feedback on the preparatory work to benchmark the starting position.
“Whilst we have been working proactively to move forward with the development of the plan and its policies, it is clear that there are significant challenges around how we identify the borough’s true housing need. It is important to keep the plan process going but in a way that responds to both local concerns and local circumstances. Some of this work relies on up-to-date data which is not yet available.
“It is very clear that it would not be appropriate to undertake a consultation on a draft plan at this stage when such significant concerns around the impact of the housing number remain, and until further and full consideration is given to this issue to ensure the council moves forward with a Plan that is robust, responsive and can be fully supported.
“As leader of the council, I have already asked officers to produce a report that clearly states what work and data is still required so that we can identify the true level of local need for housing and support changes to the planning system that give more local say over development in the future. This report will be discussed at the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday 27 September, and we will then decide on a way forward.
“Councillors and MPs up and down the country agree that the current planning system is fundamentally broken and needs a significant overhaul to put local decision making back at its heart. We will continue to work with our local government colleagues to make recommendations and suggestions on what these changes should be.
“I am heartened that everything that the new prime minister has said in recent months shows that she agrees that local need should be decided locally. It cannot be right that the borough has experienced eye watering levels of house building yet is at the same time punished for lack of housing supply.
“We need strong planning policies in place, shaped by the people who live here, that protect our borough and its environment from unsuitable development and create the kind of place we want Basingstoke and Deane to be.”