This week MP Neil Carmichael discusses neighbourhood planning

 

THIS week I attended a packed meeting in St Martin’s Church, Horsley, to support the launch of the process for a neighbourhood plan for the village.

There is considerable interest for having a plan, spurred on by the possibility of a housing development likely to be disproportionate in terms of scale and design.

The Horsley community has a track record in taking action to retain local services.

Horsley is clearly a place where community involvement has taken root and neighbourhood planning is also likely to find fertile ground, not least because of the existing body of evidence and information in the village.

The Stroud Valleys and Vale have a number of emerging neighbourhood plans with some at quite an advanced stage.

For a district with so many active and strong communities, this is not surprising. Indeed, it is important to recognise just how useful having such a plan is.

First and foremost, plans give communities the ability to shape their environment, including numbers and locations of new housing. With pressure to build new houses – there is a recognised and largely accepted demand for new homes – the ability to sensitively incorporate housing developments into existing communities is essential.

Many people in the Valleys and Vale are interesting in housing design. Appearance, materials and sustainability are some of the key determinants of housing design so neighbourhood planning does enable communities to be quite prescriptive in these respects. When Kevin McCloud spoke at last year’s Festival of Manufacturing and Engineering, the interest in design was obvious.

Another key issue is the type of housing. Without any plans, unscrupulous housing developers normally look at green fields to build large but densely located executive housing. In fact, we need more social and affordable housing, especially in our villages. Again, neighbourhood plans can be quite detailed in setting out priorities. This also applies to the use of brownfield areas.

Neighbourhood plans give communities real, meaningful power.

This is urgent as we wait for a local plan.