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Protesters plead for homes not to go in green belt

8:00am Wednesday 29th July 2009 in


New houses could be built on the Green Belt south of Oxford as early as 2013, it emerged yesterday.

In May, the Government gave the go-ahead for 4,000 new homes to be built south of Grenoble Road as part of its South East Plan, a blueprint for development in the region over the next 20 years, to help meet future housing demands in the county.

The scheme is backed by Oxford City Council, but vehemently opposed by both South Oxfordshire District Council and the Campaign to Protect Rural England.

And yesterday protesters called for building work to be postponed indefinitely.

They waved banners outside Oxford Town Hall prior to speaking at a public review of the city council’s housebuilding plans, which is being conducted by a Government planning inspector.

Hugh Jaeger, chairman of the Oxford branch of Bus Users UK, said the city council should concentrate on building homes in the city to avoid having to build in the Green Belt.

He said: “Oxford needs more homes because we have too many people who can get a job in the city, but can’t get a home, so they have to commute – and commuting is unsustainable.

“The reason why the city council is aiming at the Green Belt is they are not taking enough land for housing within the city limits.

“Oxford is already a big enough retail centre.

“The idea of competing with Swindon, Reading and Milton Keynes is mad.

“We must make better use of brownfield sites in the city. Environmentally, we don’t have an alternative.”

Michael Tyre, spokesman for the Oxfordshire branch of the CPRE, added: “We are against the urban extension.

“The planning inspector won’t be able to go against the South East Plan, but we are going to ask him to delay it as long as possible. We don’t think it’s necessary.

“Our view is it (Oxford) should be aiming for quality not quantity and leave the other towns to pick up the quantity.”

At yesterday’s inquiry, planning inspector David Fenton urged the city council and SODC to work together to ensure new homes south of Grenoble Road were properly integrated with the city’s infrastructure.

He then asked David Jackson, who was speaking for landowners Thames Water and Magdalen College, when “the first bricks could be laid?”.

Mr Jackson said that subject to the relevant planning documents being in place there was no reason why construction couldn’t start as early as “circa 2013”.

Comments(18)

Simon33 says...
8:20am Wed 29 Jul 09

Do any of the protestors live anywhere near the land in question?

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Sid Hunt says...
8:45am Wed 29 Jul 09

I would hazard a guess that some of them live in the Baldons but it might be that they simply want to protect Oxford from becoming the concrete jungle that many other places have become.

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Se says...
8:45am Wed 29 Jul 09

Probably not.
I can’t see any problem with it as long as Shops, schools, pubs, public transport etc are also included. When we first moved to Greater Leys we had a 20 minute walk to Tesco’s if we ran out of bread or milk


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diamond_day says...
9:23am Wed 29 Jul 09

Why anyone's building NEW houses is anyone's house.

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Roger Casement says...
9:34am Wed 29 Jul 09

If there were an urgent need for more houses in Oxford it would be apparent from house prices being significantly higher than in neighbouring towns and cities. They aren't.
If you are talking about public housing then it has to be accepted that human beings have not found a way to tell if there's demand-because there is no way. Public housing is a good whose price is artificially reduced, by subsidy (or eliminated through Housing Benefit.) How many would want them if they were priced properly? Who knows? So a Quango does a great big guess and we are all lumbered. This is not an intelligent way of going about things in a country which has had way over twice as much concrete covering just in the lifetime of Great War veterans Patch and Allingham. We must do better.

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Grundon Skipp says...
9:55am Wed 29 Jul 09

IMMIGRATION is the driving force behind the destruction of our green belt, and Nulabour's desire to import votes, undermine our sense of nationality prior to subsuming us into an EU superstate and provide cheap labour for big business is behind the mass immigration that has flooded our Country and is opposed by 80% of the British public.

You only have to walk round much of Oxford to see the truth of this, but here are the facts anyway:

SIX KEY FACTS
Net immigration has quadrupled since 1997 to 237,000 a year.

A migrant now arrives nearly every minute.

We must build a new home every six minutes for new migrants.

England is already the most crowded country in Europe (except Malta)

Immigration will add 7 million to the population of England in the next 20 years - that is 7 times the population of Birmingham.

To keep the population of the UK below 70 million, immigration must be reduced by 75%. Government measures so far may reduce it by 5%.

migrationwatch.co.uk



Alan Johnson , Home Secretary, recently stated that we needed MORE immigration, and that he didn't lie awake at night worrying about the UK population hitting 70 million- all this despite numerous reports showing that mass immigration DOES NOT benefit the economy, has increased strain on communities and public services and has led to lower wages, lack of training for the young and increased unemployment for British people.

This is no longer some far off debate- NuLabour's immigration disaster is affecting everything locally from getting your child into a local school, affording a house, finding a car parking space, commuting to work, seeing a doctor or dentist or simply being understood in many circumstances.

WHY are we concreting over our Country to house people overwhelmingly from the Third world who provide little measurable benefit overall?

In years to come, NuLabour's time in power will be seen as one of theiggest social, economic and environmental diasters to befall the UK.

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Foxy Lady says...
10:32am Wed 29 Jul 09

It does annoy me that one assumes that anyone protesting against bulding on green land must not a) live near it, b) be rich and well off, c) be not wanting it on my backyard mentality. Actually you need not be any of the above or even if you do belong to any category- the way forward in this country is to firstly stop the problems associated with over urbanisation, too many people, etc. It is not all about immigrants - we seem to not mention above that there is a tidal wave of nulabour nanny state children evolving who have no intention to ever work, at 16 or younger they have a kid to get a council flat, to be kept in moderate luxury without having to get up to work, to pay your mortage etc. We are paying out more in benefits than we are in receiving tax. It's time to turn the nanny state around. Unfortunately they only create more problems in building more houses, there are thousands of empty properties in Oxford - take a look around you, you can all spot one somewhere. Tell me, when the land actually runs out - where will you build then, over the sea, on Mars? Councils and Government never solve problems, they concrete over them, literally.

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LadyPenelope says...
1:41pm Wed 29 Jul 09

Sid Hunt wrote:
I would hazard a guess that some of them live in the Baldons but it might be that they simply want to protect Oxford from becoming the concrete jungle that many other places have become.
Completely agree with this.

One of the beauties of Oxford is that it's surrounded by Green Belt, and is NOT a concrete monstrosity.

By building here, we're going to lose the one thing that makes this city so special.

They should develop "Brown" land and leave the green belt alone.

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dowhat says...
2:28pm Wed 29 Jul 09

Se wrote:
Probably not.
I can’t see any problem with it as long as Shops, schools, pubs, public transport etc are also included. When we first moved to Greater Leys we had a 20 minute walk to Tesco’s if we ran out of bread or milk

Not to mention play areas, swimming pools, sports fields, allotments, community centres, youth clubs, parks, libraries, doctors & dentists surgeries, workshops, offices, parking, parking enforcement, policing, and how many other things that won't turn a profit for the developers and won't be in the plan.

The southern part of the Isle of Wight is sliding into the sea. It always has been, but vast areas of new tarmac create flash floods which erode the cliffs and hasten the process.

The "Northern Gateway" will be equally bad.

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Southern Badger says...
2:31pm Wed 29 Jul 09

If you built, say, 3 or 4 new houses in every village-sized community in the country you'd solve whatever housing problem there is supposed to be, facilitate integration into each community (as opposed to destroying it), help local employment all over the country all without putting undue strain on services. Why don't we do it? Fewer profits in it, therefore reduced kickbacks to the political elite in terms of donations to the party in power and offers of jobs on the board when they leave Parliament.
Not that I'm being cynical or anything...

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gungy says...
10:42pm Wed 29 Jul 09

Build the new houses on inner city roads as the OCC seems to be shuting down Oxford & making it a traffic no go zone.


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dowhat says...
1:38am Thu 30 Jul 09

OM story on 13 July, /news/25
First council homes planned for a generation

jockox3, Headington Hill, Oxford says...
12:35am Tue 14 Jul 09
The commercial property currently described by the council as "long term empty" is the equivalent of about £5m in business rates, or about £10m in rental values. In a pre-crash market commercial property yields would suggest that this might be worth about £200m of property lying idle. With a land value of around 60% which would be roughly double if allowed for housing that would be about £240m of land for housing within the city. Or space for about 2500 additional housing units. Without using an inch of new or currently housing land.
The commercial property currently described by the council as "long term empty" is the equivalent of about £5m in business rates, or about £10m in rental values. In a pre-crash market commercial property yields would suggest that this might be worth about £200m of property lying idle. With a land value of around 60% which would be roughly double if allowed for housing that would be about £240m of land for housing within the city. Or space for about 2500 additional housing units. Without using an inch of new or currently housing land.

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dowhat says...
1:41am Thu 30 Jul 09

And Grundon Recycling Skipp will be pleased to know that asylum seekers have just had their benefit cut, from £42 to £35pwpw.

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RoyBailey says...
2:14pm Thu 30 Jul 09

I welcome this announcement. New homes are essential for Oxford. So long as the development is eco friendly and includes all essential facilities such as schools, leisure, shops and transport, we should all applaud the decision. Oxford is a very important and strategic British city. For it to thrive, developments like this will be necessary. That is not to say we should be reckless with future plans. Some of the comments, particularly those about immigration, are tasteless and pernicious. By all means let's debate the proposal but racism and xenaphobia should have no place in such discussions.

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Bargain Bucket says...
2:46am Fri 31 Jul 09

Duwat. If the government was strong and sent home all of the people that shouldn't be here, that would be £35 x 2-5 million per week, free up homes for our people and give a lot more money to build new ones. But unfortunately people like Grundon who are not afraid to speak the truth are either ridiculed, shouted down, or if that fails, the old racism card is played. New affordable homes are desperately needed in Oxford as anyone on the housing list will tell you. Even the council admits that more people on the list will die before being offered a place to live, myself and my wife both work, have to rent privately £980 per month and receive £187.32 PER WEEK housing benefit out of YOUR tax money, it is a disgrace. Surely building more houses (if they are not going to fill them with illegals) and having working people in them paying rent (against us having to claim benefit to pay the mortgage of a landlord that already has 6 houses, out of your tax money) makes sense. But to be honest with you getting paid to live in a nice part of Oxford, sure beats paying to live on a council estate. So Hugh, Michael and the rest, please carry on with your campaign, and carry on paying my rent. Thank you very much.

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dowhat says...
9:00am Fri 31 Jul 09

Chucking you out would be 6 times more cost effective, and allow the classmates of your children to receive a better education. I have previously stated that I would like you to refund some of my taxes.

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Bargain Bucket says...
1:49pm Fri 31 Jul 09

Duwat. It is not my fault if the council wish to spend your money this way, blame the system not me. Anyway time for friday club down the boozer, can't be late.

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Bargain Bucket says...
5:26am Sat 1 Aug 09

Duwat. would love to refund you but The City Arms, Hobgoblin, Bully, New Inn, Aziz, and Baby Love took all my (sorry your) cash tonight. Got to go and sleep it off. The lads have got a Big one planned for later

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