The West's housing boom is a result of an 'intolerable' situation with a 'broken' planning system leading to thousands of new homes getting planning permission.
That was the view of local politicians, campaigners and planning officers as new figures revealed the South West is experiencing a bigger growth in new homes being finished than almost anywhere else in the country.
Some 3,275 new homes were registered in just the three months between November last year and the end of January this year across the South West, a jump of 37 per cent on the same three month period – normally a quiet time of the year – 12 months earlier.
The director of developers' association the NHBC said 2014 would be 'a strong year' for their industry.
"Our figures show that the industry enjoyed a strong start to 2014 by maintaining the momentum from the previous year," said Richard Tamayo.
"Both private and public sectors reported growth on the same month in 2013 and we look forward to hopefully seeing this trend continue throughout the year to help meet the demand for new homes," he added.
Much of the growth for 2014 looks set to happen in high-demand areas of Wiltshire, Swindon and the Cotswolds, where virtually every town has a major planning battle in progress.
The failure of Wiltshire Council's planning chiefs to allocate enough new homes in their Core Strategy has seen Government inspectors send it back unfinished, opening the door to a host of developers in Corsham, Chippenham, Devizes and Calne.
In Calne, residents continued their battle at a public inquiry into 125 controversial new homes on the edge of the town this week, even though council chiefs gave up the fight.
In Devizes, plans for 230 homes have been passed following the Core Strategy debacle, although council chiefs are continuing to fight against 350 homes on the edge of the town at Coate Bridge.
The long-standing chairman of the conservation group The Trust for Devizes, Ted East, said the Government's scrapping of the old planning system had opened the door to huge developments.
Mr East, who steps down from the post later this month, said the planning system 'was broken' and now at the whim of 'greedy developers'. "Speculators have deep pockets and employ the best legal advisers to win appeals," he said.
Further north, in Malmesbury, developers White Lion Land have appealed against a second refusal for 77 homes on the edge of the town, even though the entrance to their planned estate has been flooded nine times since Christmas Eve.
Planners are fighting that appeal, and another one for 180 homes on the other side of town, as Malmesbury is one of the first communities to draw up a Neighbourhood Plan, which is suggesting development in other places instead.
And across the border in Gloucestershire, it was revealed this week that Cotswold District Council had spent a quarter of a million pounds on legal fees trying to defend against developers at a series of appeals.
The CDC planning authority is in 'serious danger' of being put in special measures after failing to adopt a five-year supply of housing land, which then prompted developers to fight and win appeals to build hundreds of homes on the edge of Tetbury and Cirencester.
Cotswold councillor and Lib Dem parliamentary candidate Paul Hodgkinson said the situation was 'intolerable'.
"The council has spent this amount of taxpayers' money on defending appeals by developers, most of which are being lost because of the lack of a five year housing supply and an up to date Local Plan," he said. "It is an intolerable situation."
↧
