THIS new description of the plans to bury more of mid-Oxfordshire under roads and house building, is the action of a government to desperately boost house building. The area’s plans to build these houses are already within the revised Local Plan of Cherwell District Council, shortly to face the planning inspector’s public enquiry.

The title of Garden City adds but 1,500 more. The Chancellor’s statement backed by Nick Clegg’s (missing from the front benches at the Chancellor’s autumn statement) statement in your paper also attempts to give substance to this ploy.

Nobody doubts the government’s cash boost of a £100m for roads, and other improvements will take place; they have done that before at the early discussion stages of the eco town. Those cash promises were another bribe to push their intents through. The grand initial plans for a factory there churning out prefabricated houses employing 2,000 people has never materialised.

Today’s letters

The proposal also features 21,500 new jobs, with no explanation of how this employment miracle will take place. This is a staggering number.

To date, only one in 40 jobs added to the economy between 2008-2014 has been on a full-time basis. Virtually little substantive employment has been added to this area, since the building of the Mars warehouse employing only a handful and councillors turning down the application by Unipart to build a new factory. Residents realise that announcements of jobs created at the shopping village and other supermarkets are really invalid, since increased employment and expansion there leads to bleeding and shutdown of the smaller shopkeeper.

There is only a fixed amount of cash to be spent and increased internet buying also sends local business into decline.

As to the vast house building numbers of 13,000 quoted – there is a serious shortage of skilled workers in that industry.

Their training board has stated it lost almost 400,000 men during the recession and another 400,000 are due to retire in the next five years.

The Observer has called the Chancellor’s announcements and his future cuts also taking us back to the lowest levels of public spending since the 30’s, aptly as “causing voters to walk through a hall of distorted mirrors and truthful reflection difficult to find”. That is very apt also, for residents here.

Donald A Robinson, St Edburg’s Close, Bicester

  • Do you want alerts delivered straight to your phone via our WhatsApp service? Text NEWS or SPORT or NEWS AND SPORT, depending on which services you want, and your full name to 07767 417704. Save our number into your phone’s contacts as Oxford Mail WhatsApp and ensure you have WhatsApp installed.