LETTER: We need houses not building land

Can anyone please explain why there appears to be such a panic from the Government, in particular the Bristol planning inspectors, to increase the reserve of building land, when Horsham already has a reserve of land for 7,000 houses , which will meet the projected building programme for at least the next ten years.

Surely the focus of the Government should be on introducing special powers /incentives to kickstart the house building on this land, instead of thinking about penalising our council for taking over 13 weeks to process planning applications.

It’s houses we need, not building land, at the moment.

Energising the house building programme now, at a time when house prices are rising, interest rates are low and our young are struggling to find local jobs must make sense.

Until the house supply from large schemes across the district, like north of the A264 and the new town suggested by some near Albourne, coupled with the impact that large construction projects, like the second runway at Gatwick and the high speed upgrade of the Brighton to London Rail link, are known with some degree of accuracy , it seems senseless for the Government Planning Inspectors and local government planning departments to waste our money on looking at the margins, investigating planning applications on green field sites outside the BUAB of villages.

Now that many Parish Neighbourhood teams have been established, they will be in a good position within 12 months to bring some pragmatic localism to support the hard-pressed Horsham planning departments.

We need our MPs to be bold and apply pragmatic leadership and insist on a year’s planning moratorium outside BUAB for Horsham villages, to enable the localism and detail that Parish Neighbourhood teams will bring to the planning process, to be used.

CHRIS BEER

Swallowfield Close, Mannings Heath