The new government’s planning reforms - what do they mean for us?

You will all have seen in the national and local media the reforms the new government is bringing in in order to fulfil their pledge to build 1.5 million new homes over the next five years. 

But what might these reforms mean for our area and our communities? 

A lot of things are uncertain at the moment, but what we do know is that local authorities such as our own Winchester City Council are being told that their housebuilding targets are going to have to increase - in Winchester’s case by 63%. 

This is a huge increase on what WCC is currently planning for. 

The new draft of Winchester’s local plan (known as the Regulation 19 draft), which will guide development in the District up until 2040, is due to be published shortly for public consultation. Over the 20 years of the plan, it provides for just over 15,500 new homes to be built in the whole of Winchester District. The new calculation would require nearly 22,000 to be built over the 20 years – an increase of some 6,500. 

The government has also set up a New Towns Task Force, with the job of identifying locations for large new towns of 10,000 plus dwellings. These would be on top of the increased housing targets. 

We can all immediately imagine the worst-case scenario for our area. 6,500 extra homes is spookily close in number to the 6,000-home new town at Micheldever being promoted by John Magnier and O’Flynn Group. 

And then of course there is the new government’s support for large new towns. O’Flynn Group has already made it clear that they support joining Micheldever new town to the ‘garden village’ of 3,000 homes proposed by Basingstoke council on Popham Airfield. No doubt they are already working hard on a proposal to put before the New Towns Task Force. 

WCC is bringing forward the publication of its Regulation 19 draft with the aim of getting the local plan as close as possible to being adopted before the new reforms come into force (likely to be early next year). This could be a risky strategy. Developers such as O’Flynn Group may well challenge the plan. Even if the local plan is adopted with the lower housing numbers, under the new reforms the council would be required to start drafting a new local plan immediately to address the shortfall.

Clearly the Dever Society is going to have to be very busy over the next few months, and is going to need all the help it can get. Please join us and ask your friends and neighbours to join us too.