Chichester district facing much higher housing requirement

Sweeping changes to the planning system would leave West Sussex having to build an extra 2,234 homes each year with the Chichester district in line to take a proportion of this extra development.
Boris Johnson at a building site last week promoting the government's new planning reforms (Photo by Phil Noble - WPA Pool/Getty Images)Boris Johnson at a building site last week promoting the government's new planning reforms (Photo by Phil Noble - WPA Pool/Getty Images)
Boris Johnson at a building site last week promoting the government's new planning reforms (Photo by Phil Noble - WPA Pool/Getty Images)

Councils across the county are currently trawling through the details of the government’s ‘planning for the future’ White Paper as well as preparing their responses for a second consultation on changes to planning policy and regulations.

Those changes include altering the way housing figures are calculated – replacing the current local housing need with local housing requirements, essentially adding 300,000 homes per year to the nationwide figures.

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Figures from planning and development consultancy Lichfields show how the changes would affect West Sussex councils.

One of the biggest changes would fall on Arun District Council, whose housing requirement would rise from 1,368 homes to 2,063 per year.

The figures show that, over the past three years, the council has delivered an average of 647 homes per year.

Elsewhere in the county, Chichester District Council’s would go from 753 to 1,120.

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Its 2015 local plan target was 435 homes a year, with the area delivering an average of 630 homes over the past three years.

The White Paper has been described as ‘vague, damaging and ineffectual’ by The Campaign to Protect Rural England – Sussex.

The charity warned the proposals ‘could hand thousands of acres of rural Sussex over to developers who will be able to build without going through the planning process’.

Meanwhile writing this week, the Rt Revd Dr Martin Warner, Bishop of Chichester, argued that the drive to build new houses is something to be welcomed, but not at any price.

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He said: “We need good new neighbourhoods, not just lots of new houses.”

He felt these neighbourhoods not only had to contribute to a reduction in our carbon footprint, but also develop their own character of diversity and have architecture that makes a statement about dignity and human achievement.

The White Paper divides land into three categories – growth, renewal and protected.

In growth areas, outline permission would be automatically given for developments specified in a council’s local plan; renewal areas would be seen as suitable for some development; and protected areas would see development restricted.

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Councils would also be able to set aside land in ‘growth’ areas for self-built and custom-built homes.

The proposed changes brought a mixed reaction from West Sussex councillors.

Chichester District Council is in the middle of producing its Local Plan.

While a spokesman said the full impact of the changes was unclear, Adrian Moss, leader of the Lib Dems, called the plans ‘ambitious’.

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Mr Moss said some of the proposed changes were ‘laudable’ but shared the concerns of others that they would ‘make life easier for developers’ while reducing the opportunity for local residents to feel ‘truly involved in the planning process’.

He added: “This is very ambitious and a huge potential change in all aspects of planning.

“Can this be delivered or will specific options be cherry picked, losing the local aspect, driving more controls into central government and reducing the opportunity for affordable housing?”

The proposed changes will provoke plenty of debate in the corridors of Westminster over the next few months.

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Andrew Griffith, MP for Arundel and South Downs which includes parts of Horsham, Chichester, Mid Sussex and Arun districts, said: “There are some welcome initiatives such as the focus on building upon brownfield land, a locally set design code for new dwellings, better energy efficient standards and requirement to enhance bio-diversity.

“Post Covid, I want to see us building ‘up not out’ – attractive homes in existing towns and cities and converting the vast amount of now unused offices to dwellings in those areas where the infrastructure already exists - not developments on the unspoilt green fields of West Sussex such as those proposed at Mayfields, Adversane and West Grinstead that would only be accessible by motor car.”

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