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ADD Update, 8 November 2019: A quick but important update – please take a few seconds to read! ADD is supporting St Francis Animal Sanctuary, based on Mortimers Lane in Fair Oak, in its efforts to persuade Keith House, leader of Eastleigh Borough Council, that his Local Plan proposal for the development of housing in the adjacent to Mortimers Lane (the so-called Option C area) will have a devastating impact on the animal sanctuary. Eastleigh has not even responded to requests from St Francis to recognise the problems that will occur if Eastleigh’s ill-considered plan goes ahead, let alone help them find a solution. A planning inspector will start her public examination of Eastleigh’s Local Plan on 21 November, with hearings lasting for a period of six weeks.

To sign St Francis’s petition “to tell EBC and its leader they can’t ride roughshod over a charity, its staff and animals like this” (see details below), click here.

PETITION TO SAVE ST FRANCIS ANIMAL WELFARE

“We the undersigned demand that Eastleigh Borough Council and its leaders save St Francis Animal Welfare by consulting with them, allowing an agreed amount of sufficient open space around them and a belt of woodland to mitigate noise.

Eastleigh Borough Council’s Local Plan for development would surround us with houses and shops and push us and our animals out of our shelter. This happened to us with development around our old shelter in Horton Heath 40 years ago. Our manager felt unsafe in her home because of all the noise complaints and aggression. Development up to our borders in the EBC plan will make our lives impossible like before.

Eastleigh Borough Council and its leaders have ignored this and all the concerns that we’ve put to them.

We need the plan to have lots of open space around us to walk our dogs, and for the sake of people in any new development. We also need a belt of woodland to mitigate the noise our animals make.

Please sign and share our petition to tell EBC & its leader they can’t ride roughshod over a charity, its staff & animals like this. We’re one of Hampshire’s oldest animal charities who help animals from all over Hampshire and beyond.

Save St Francis Animal Welfare!

For more information on the work that we do at St Francis Animal Welfare, please visit our website.”

ADD UPDATE, 1 November October 2019: As you’ll recall from our post of 11 October, the Independent Planning Inspector will begin her examination of Eastleigh’s Local Plan at Botleigh Grange Hotel & Spa on 21 November, running until the end of January.

Given how much hard work ADD’s volunteers, supporters and professional advisers have put into fighting Eastleigh’s Plan, we are asking everyone who is against it to turn up at Botleigh Grange Hotel & Spa (SO30 2GA) at 8.30am on Friday 22 November. This will be half an hour before the start of the day’s examination, and will enable us to demonstrate the strength of public feeling against this appalling plan. Our aim is to have a giant ‘team photo’ outside the front of the hotel at 8.30am.

To give us a sense of who is able to come, not least so that we can arrange suitable logistics, please either register here at our Facebook event or email [email protected] to let us know.

If you can’t make 8.30am but would like to come at another part of the day, the hearing finishes at 5.30pm. Whatever time you come, you will see many of the ADD team there.

We at ADD firmly believe Eastleigh’s Plan is unsustainable and unworkable. The examination process will expose this. Thanks for all your support so far. The last time we turned up in force was on 14 December 2017, when over 800 of us made our voice heard against the council’s shocking plans. 

While the evidence will do the talking at the Inspector’s examination, it is essential that as many of us as possible make our feelings felt – for one last time – on 22 November. We look forward to seeing everyone there, ideally at 8.30am! 

ADD UPDATE, 31 October 2019: A Bishopstoke-based professional artist is so incensed by Eastleigh’s Local Plan that he has donated a beautiful painting (above) to support ADD’s fundraising efforts as we prepare our case for the Planning Inspector’s examination, which starts on 21 November.

For Paul Stratton of East Drive, who has lived in the village all his life, the countryside and woodlands near his home are an inspiration for many of his pictures. The 16 x 20 inch (40 cm x 50 cm) framed oil painting he has contributed shows Bishopstoke Woods as seen from Upper Barn Copse. The view would disappear if the Local Plan went ahead, even though the area has one of the highest levels of bio-diversity in the borough.

Paul’s painting is being auctioned here. This one-off auction will run until 5pm on 15 November.

“As a pensioner on a fixed income, I am in no position to make a large financial contribution so this is my way of helping ADD,” says Paul. “If the Local Plan went ahead it would be a disaster for the village and its environment.”

ADD is currently raising money to employ the legal and consultancy support it needs to make its case when the Planning Inspector starts her hearings into the Local Plan in three weeks.

“We have enjoyed considerable support with our fundraising, as we approach the final stage of the campaign leading up to the Planning Inspector’s examination next month. However, the fact that the whole process has been drawn out by Eastleigh and their continual release of further reports which try to justify their flawed plan, all of which have to be assessed, has meant additional expense. We now need to be able to engage our specialist consultants to attend at key stages of the Inspector’s examination and we have limited ability to do so,” said ADD chair John Lauwerys.

“We are immensely grateful to Paul for his support. It is a great illustration of how the community in Bishopstoke and elsewhere in Eastleigh is pulling together to back our campaign. We feel buoyed by the support that we are receiving.”

If you do not wish to bid for Paul’s painting but would like to donate to ADD’s campaign, click here.  Whether you have given before, or will be giving for the first time, your donations will be crucial in ensuring we are able to present our arguments as forcefully as possible at the Inspector’s forthcoming hearings.

Thank you!

ADD UPDATE, 11 October 2019: From 21 November until the end of January the Independent Planning Inspector will be conducting multiple hearings to assess the viability of Eastleigh’s Local Plan.

ADD has been working hard towards this examination and with thanks to your generous support have hired planning, environmental, traffic and legal experts to ensure the case against the current plan is well fought.

In addition to supplying the expert information we need to make sure the Inspector understands the strength of public feeling against this unsustainable and unworkable plan. We want to demonstrate just how much we care!

So on Friday 22 November we are asking for ADD’s Army to turn out in force and show the valid concerns amongst the local community. If you can come for the whole day that would be brilliant. Even if you can only attend for an hour or two your presence matters. Ideally, we would like as many people as possible outside the front of the hotel at 8.30am for a giant ‘team photo’. The hearing starts 9.00am and finishes at 5.30pm. 

We will be releasing more details nearer the time but in the meantime please do share with family and friends. Click here to our Facebook event. 

We at ADD firmly believe the plan is unsustainable and unworkable. The examination process will expose this. Thanks for all your support so far. The last time we turned up in force was on 14 December 2017, when over 800 of us made our voice heard against the council’s shocking plans. By joining together as a community we really can make a difference.

While the evidence will do the talking at the Inspector’s examination, it’s essential that as many of us as possible make our feelings felt – for one last time – on 22 November.

We look forward to seeing everyone there! Once more with feeling.

ADD UPDATE, 4 October 2019: Several of our supporters received yesterday an invitation from Richard Eastham of Feria Urbanism, an urban planning consultancy employed by Eastleigh Borough Council, “to take part in a series of workshop events to develop the design and planning ideas” for the Strategic Growth Option (SGO) in Eastleigh’s proposed Local Plan, namely the land north of Bishopstoke and Fair Oak which has been earmarked for around 5,300 new homes and new estate road (see Feria’s map above). 

But wait a minute. Isn’t this all be a bit premature? As one of our Eastleigh-based supporters told us: “Eastleigh’s shocking proposals haven’t yet been approved by the Planning Inspector. Indeed, her examination doesn’t start until 21 November and the result won’t be known until next spring. As an Eastleigh resident, I’m asking if it’s a wise use of public funds to carry out these workshops ahead of the Planning Inspector’s decision. Eastleigh council has already spent over £3 million on this plan. I’m concerned they’re throwing good money after bad!”

On a similar note, another of our supporters said: “It also seems odd to me that drainage and electrical infrastructure in Mortimers Lane is being upgraded. Could this be in anticipation of a positive result for the SGO? If so, is Eastleigh council trying to bounce everyone into accepting a fait accompli?” This might have been a sensible tactic at the Regulation 19 [earlier consultation] stage when they were still in control of the process. However, that’s no longer the case. The Planning Inspector now holds the cards. She will decide whether the plan is sound or not.” 

ADD has been working tirelessly for over three years to highlight the many shortcomings in the process and evidence for Eastleigh’s proposals. We are currently finalising our arguments, bringing together the advice of our planning, environmental, traffic and legal advisers so we can make our case against the SGO as strongly as possible at the examination.

We look forward to presenting these arguments, alongside our many allies and supporters, over the next few months.

ADD UPDATE, 30 September 2019: Last week, Christa Masters, the Planning Inspector for Eastleigh’s Local Plan, published her initial questions regarding Eastleigh’s proposed plan – her so-called ‘Schedule of Matters and Issues for the Examination’. And she has a lot of questions – more than 220 of them! Ms Masters’ examination will be held at the Botleigh Grange Hotel in Hedge End, starting on Thursday 21 November and running for six weeks. Her initial questions are grouped under six headings, as follows:

1. Legal and Procedural requirements
2. Vision and Objectives, the Sustainability Appraisal and Habitats Regulations Assessment
3. Strategic Policies, Spatial Strategy and distribution of development
4. Meeting housing need, the housing requirement, housing land supply, five year supply and affordable housing
5. Strategic growth option (Options B and C)
6. Transport, Infrastructure and Delivery
7. General housing matters
8. Countryside and Green Infrastructure
9. Gypsies and travellers, Nature conservation, recreation and open space and heritage
10. Meeting employment need and the rural economy
11. Community facilities, retail development
12. Climate change, flood risk and pollution
13. Site Allocations within the Parishes

To read Ms Master’s questions, please click here. For the dates of the particular hearing sessions, please click here.

ADD continues to work hard to prepare for the examination, bringing together the advice of our planning, environmental, traffic and legal advisers into forceful arguments against the Strategic Growth Option (5,500 new houses north of Fair Oak and Bishopstoke), which Eastleigh Borough Council – against public opinion and much advice – wants to put on the borough’s last remaining open countryside, far from public transport infrastructure.

We look forward to presenting these arguments, alongside our many allies and supporters, in a couple of months’ time.

NOTES

The Planning Inspector’s questions came in an email from the Programme Officer’s last Tuesday, 24 September. To read this email, see below:

Programme Officer: Louise St John Howe
PO Services, PO Box 10965,
Sudbury, Suffolk CO10 3BY,
email: [email protected]:
Tel: 07789-48641

Good Afternoon,

Following my email of 19 August 2019 notifying you of the dates for the Hearing Sessions of the Eastleigh Local Plan Examination, I am now writing to give you further details concerning the Hearing sessions.

Please find attached the following documents, which can also be accessed via the link https://www.eastleigh.gov.uk/planning-and-building/planning-policy-and-implementation/local-plan/local-plan-examination/examination-documents

ED41 Inspector’s Matters, Issues and Questions

ED42 Draft Hearing Sessions Programme – Please note that there are alterations to some of the hearing session dates set out in my earlier email.

ED43 Inspector’s Guidance Notes V.3 Please note the new deadline for hearing statements for Matters 7-14

The Inspector’s Guidance Notes set out the procedures which will be followed during the Examination, including full details on the provision of hearing statements (paras 14-19) and participation at the hearing sessions (paras 22-24)

Hearing Statements (both hard copies and electronic copies)

• Deadline for Hearing Statements Matters 1-6 inclusive (both hard and electronic copies) to be received by the Programme Officer: 5.00 pm on Friday 18 October.
• Deadline for Hearing Statements Matters 7-14 inclusive (both hard and electronic copies) to be received by the Programme Officer: 5.00 pm on Friday 22 November.

The Council have prepared schedules of the Representations received on the submission version of the Local Plan together and Eastleigh Borough Council responses. These documents are posted in the Examination Documents with the following references, and can be accessed via the link below:-

ED40A Legal and Soundness
ED40B Strategic Policies
ED40C Site Allocations
ED40D Development Management Policies
ED40E Other Comments
ED40F Site Notices Consultation

https://www.eastleigh.gov.uk/planning-and-building/planning-policy-and-implementation/local-plan/local-plan-examination/examination-documents

The Council’s proposed Modifications to the Local Plan can be viewed in the Examination Documents and have the reference numbers ED32 and ED34. Please look at these documents before preparing your hearing statements as you will be able to see if the Council is proposing modification(s) which would address the objection(s) raised in your Representation on the submission version of the Local Plan.

Participation at the Hearing sessions

A reminder that the deadline for notifying me if you would like to take part in the hearing sessions is 5.00 pm on Friday 11 October.

Please get in touch with me by phone or email if you have any queries about the Examination or would like further clarification on any of the details in this letter.

Kind regards,

Louise

Louise St John Howe
Programme Officer,
PO Services, PO Box 10965,
Sudbury, Suffolk CO10 3BF
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 07789-486419

ENDS

Open letter to Keith House, Leader of Eastleigh Borough Council, from Annette Lodge, Chair of St Francis Animal Welfare, 10 September 2019: “Dear Councillor House, Staff, volunteers and Trustees of St Francis Animal Welfare (SFAW) shelter are desperately worried about the proposed huge housing development in Local Plan Options B&C; if permitted, this would come very close to the shelter and make our lives extremely difficult if not impossible. Now we have an application from Mortimers Farm across the road and we are being encroached on from all sides. Frankly it is shocking that Eastleigh and the developers have ignored the problems we will face with the Local Plan Options B & C, if approved…” To read the full letter click here.

ADD UPDATE: 24 August 2019: The government should discourage personal vehicle use to meet its legally binding target of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, according to a report published last week by the Commons Science and Technology Select committee. In its report, the cross-party committee makes clear that progress towards the 2050 target is slow and being inhibited by various government actions and inactions.

Although it did not mention Eastleigh by name, the borough council’s Local Plan is a textbook illustration of the kind of policies that the report makes clear would guarantee the UK misses its carbon-reduction targets. Eastleigh Borough Council (EBC) may have recently declared a climate emergency  but it is showing itself to be part of the problem rather than the solution.   

One of the report’s key concerns relates to the use of cars. It points out that, while electric vehicles are cleaner in use, their manufacture is far from carbon-neutral. Indeed, the MPs conclude ‘in the long-term, widespread vehicle ownership does not appear compatible with significant de-carbonisation’ (see para 131 of the report here).

EBC has agreed to set up a cross-party working group to figure out how to make Eastleigh carbon-neutral by 2030. As part of its work, this group will have to consider the impact of the council’s draft Local Plan, which runs to 2036. As we know, the Local Plan includes proposals for around 5,500 new houses – around 2,000 more than government targets to 2036 actually require – in countryside north of Fair Oak and Bishopstoke (so-called options B and C) that has no easy access to rail transport and will be heavily car-dependent.

Nobody can possibly predict if these 2,000 extra houses will be needed in the borough in this particular location as far ahead as into the 2040s (the Office of National Statistics’ population growth projections currently suggest it is unlikely). The real, unspoken reason that the council wants the extra 2,000 houses is to pay for a new road that is essential to the building of any new homes in such a remote area. And, of course, the new road, which will carve its way between several areas of ancient woodland, is necessary to carry the thousands of new cars that the commons select committee is saying we want to discourage. What a mess! If you want to maximise car usage and CO2 emissions, then you will love this plan.

Eastleigh’s Local Plan is due to be examined by the government’s planning inspector over six weeks of hearings starting on 21 November. Amongst other things, she will be looking at whether the council’s chosen Plan is deliverable and sustainable. As ADD has been saying for over three years, ever since the council mooted the idea of development in options B and C, the Plan looks neither.

We have known all along that there are alternatives. However, at every turn, the council has ignored them. In the words of paragraph 182 of the National Planning Policy Framework, our primary goal has always been for the council “to adopt the most appropriate strategy when considered against the reasonable alternatives, based on proportionate evidence.” 

Our extensive work, carried out by our professional consultants and unpaid volunteers, has left us convinced that there are big gaps, inaccuracies and contradictions in the council’s evidence base, as well as serious flaws in their processes. We are working hard to prepare our arguments and will present them in a clear and focused way at the planning inspector’s examination.

ADD UPDATE, 20 August 2019: At long last, we have dates for the Planning Inspector’s examination of Eastleigh’s Local Plan. The hearing sessions will open on Thursday 21 November and run for a period of six weeks. Below is an email sent yesterday by Louise St John Howe, the Programme Officer, with all the details.

As you will read, the Inspector, Christa Masters, will publish her statement of Matters, Issues and Questions – which will make clear what she intends to focus on to determine if Eastleigh’s Plan is sound – during the week commencing 23 September. Once she has done this, we will give guidance to our supporters on what to expect, how to follow proceedings and what further assistance, if any, we may need.

STARTS

Good Evening, 

As the Programme Officer for the Eastleigh Borough Council Local Plan Examination,  I am writing to  inform all those who submitted a Representation at the Regulation 19 Stage, when the Council invited comments on the submission draft of the Local Plan, that the hearing sessions of the Examination have now been arranged and are set out below.   

Hearing Sessions

These will all be held in the Millennium Suite at the Botleigh Grange Hotel, Grange Road, Hedge End, Southampton, Hampshire, SO30 2GA and will open on Thursday 21 November, 2019 at 10.00 am.They will run for a period of six weeks on the following dates:-

Week 1:   Thursday 21 November, Friday 22 November 

Week 2:   Tuesday 26 November, Wednesday 27 November, Thursday 28 November

Week 3:   Wednesday 4 December, Thursday 5 December, Friday 6 December

Week 4:   Wednesday 8 January, Thursday 9 January

Week 5:   Tuesday 14 January, Wednesday 15 January, Thursday 16 January

Week 6:   Tuesday 28 January, Wednesday 29 January, Thursday 30 January 

Inspector’s Guidance Notes 

I am attaching a copy of the Inspector’s Guidance Notes which set out the process of the Examination and give information on the provision of hearing statements and how to register to take part in the hearing sessions.  On the last page of the Guidance Notes you will find a chart which sets out the key dates associated with the Hearing Sessions.  

Please note that if you wish to participate in any of the hearing sessions you will need to notify me of this by 11 October, even if you indicated in your response at Regulation 19 that you wished to take part.   The Inspector’s Matters, Issues and Questions and Draft Programme for the hearing sessions will be sent out w/c 23 September so that you have time to decide which of the hearing sessions would be most relevant for the issues you wish to discuss.  

Please get in touch with me by phone or email if you have any queries about the Examination or would like further clarification on any of the details in this email, however I will not be available between 20th August and 9th September as I will be on leave during this period.    

Kind regards,

Louise St John Howe
Programme Officer,
PO Services, PO Box 10965,
Sudbury, Suffolk CO10 3BF
Email:  [email protected]
Phone:   07789-486419

ENDS

Hampshire Chronicle, 4 August 2019: PROPOSALS for development between Eastleigh and Colden Common are still dividing planners. Eastleigh Borough Council wants to see a chunk of development on countryside between Bishopstoke/Fair Oak and Colden Common, with more than 5,000 new homes and new link road between Allbrook Hill, Bishopstoke and Fair Oak. The area abuts the boundary of the Winchester district, with the proposed road cutting into Winchester. A Statement of Common Ground has been drawn up by the two authorities stating each authority’s position for submission to a planning inspector who will examine the Eastleigh Local Plan. In this document, Winchester has raised several concerns about Eastleigh’s proposals for the area.