The chickens are coming home to roost, so the chickens need to plan a coop!?

It’s looking increasingly likely that the local Tory scheme to turn a blind eye to people who move to Uttlesford to live will get short-shrift from the Tory-Lib Dem coalition.

The Tory adminstration decided to cut its future housing targets by ignoring the needs of people who move to this area from many places including Harlow and London. Then they discovered that move was not lawful. More on this story here.

Reports coming out of Westminster say that the government is determined to push for housing growth to meet an alarmingly large need. They also place a lot of score on planning for inmigration – the opposite of what Uttlesford wants to do with its unworkable “drawbridge” policy. 

I think local opinion is starting to shift. A public workshop in Saffron Walden on Monday to work up new priorities for Uttlesford’s planning framework concluded that new homes and new jobs must be high on the list.

Homes being built at Stansted Mountfitchet

So where next? Stansted and Newport parish councils are being encouraged to prepare Neighbourhood Plans. This was recently debated at an area forum. On Wednesday I was at a meeting of Stansted Parish Council for a second look at this uncertain process. Andrew Taylor, UDC’s head of planning was there to try to explain why Stansted should (or should not?) produce one.

The catch is that a Neighbourhood Plan (NHB) is a way for a parish like Stansted to add a statutory very local plan into the Uttlesford planning authority’s own statutory plan, but can only ADD MORE development to what Uttlesford wants.

That would be fine if we knew what development Uttlesford wants at Stansted Mountfitchet (and elsewhere). But it doesn’t. It’s planning process is paralysed by its ill advised decision to cut the housing targets. So months of further delay and uncertainty are in likely.

Of course, Uttlesford could rescind its decision to cut housing targets, become legal again and resume planning a distributed housing solution instead of its new town ambition. Then places like Stansted might feel safe in drawing up a Neighbourhood Plan free from the fear of having to deal with a mercurial district council.

Neighbourhood Plans are meant to be a good thing; a way for villages and towns to define their own future.

The chickens want a coop. They are wary of foxes. Stop being chicken!