This has been a bumper week for letters and articles about Uttlesford’s local plan. I blogged last week with a piece by MP Alan Haselhurst. This has now appeared in letter and article form in four more papers; the Walden Local, Dunmow Broadcast, Saffron Walden Reporter  and Weekly News.

The rest of the letters’ pages are dominated by the local plan. Paul Draper attacks independent county councillor John Lodge and United Uttlesford Residents in the Local, Reporter and Broadcast for opposing the local plan, alleging they are against all new homes. Gerard Franks in the Local attacks me as a “political opportunist” for fighting “tooth and nail” against the “Hellsenham” new town.

Conservative district councillor appears in the Local, Broadcast, Reporter and Weekly News calling for “a constructive relationship between the various housing campaign groups and the Conservatives at Uttlesford” to get “the right result for the community overall”. At first sight he calls for what I suggested last week; “district councillors, town and parish councillors, members of the campaign groups from the towns and villages across the district and our MP” working together.

My aim was to work out sites for the homes. The problem is that Cllr Sadler’s aim for this group is to lobby government ministers to allow councils to decide their own housing numbers and to restart their local plans without any external pressure. But haven’t we been here before? Isn’t a belief that a council can ignore the demands of the housing market and housing need what got us into the mess Uttlesford is now in?

Rory Gleeson writes in the Weekly News challenging a previous attack on campaign groups for being Nimbys. He accuses the earlier writer from a village with minimal housing growth plans of being a Nimby himself. County councillor John Lodge complains in the Weekly News about the absence of highways and educational infrastructure. Matt North writes in similar vein in the Reporter, calling on developers in Saffron Walden to fund a new school and a link road.

A thoughtful letter from Jen Beaton, who writes as families spokesperson for weareresidents.org, questions the latest housing numbers in the Broadcast, Reporter andWeekly News. She says that UDC has constantly quoted a housing waiting list of 1,600 as the basis for local plan housing targets. She questions whether the figures stack up against a planned total several times that number and accuses the council of misleading the public.

Jen Beaton has every justification for her accusations. UDC has never been straight with the public about why it has to plan for the levels of new housing it has put forward at various times. The housing waiting list is only part of the equation. A larger element is the number of people who choose to move to Uttlesford as a place to live, work and commute out for work to places like for London. Uttlesford has avoided to truth for too long. This is why there is so much distrust of the council and its motives.

Read here Walden Local letters page 9, page 10 and page 14.

Read here  Dunmow Broadcast letters.

Read here Saffron Walden Reporter letters.

Read here Saffron Walden Weekly News letters.