MP slams mayoral candidate over housing plan
A SOLIHULL MP has hit back at West Midlands mayoral candidate Siôn Simon after he said housing should be built on the town’s green belt land.
Mr Simon, Labour candidate in the May 4 election, said Solihull was blocking new housing and also pointed out that the town is one of the wealthiest parts of the West Midlands.
But he was criticised by Dame Caroline Spelman (Con, Meriden), one of Solihull borough’s two MPs, who pointed out that the West Midlands mayor will not have any powers to require building on the green belt.
She said: “Mr Simon has failed to acknowledge that Solihull has in recent years, already sacrificed much of its green belt in order to support strategically important regional and national infrastructure such as the NEC, the expansion of the runway at Birmingham Airport and the expansion of Jaguar Land Rover.
“This is on top of planned construction HS2 and remodelling Junction 6 of the M42 the coming months.”
Dame Caroline said: “Solihull acknowledges that it has a duty to co-operate with its neighbours to help meet demand for housing, and for that reason Solihull borough council recently con- the of of in sulted on a bespoke local plan to meet housing need – which includes additional provision to assist Birmingham and Coventry.” She called on mayoral candidates to make use of a £200 million national fund to clean up brownfield sites, such as former industrial land, so that it can be used for housing. Mr Simon called for housing on Solihull green belt during last week’s mayoral hustings, which were hosted by the Birmingham Post & Mail Mr Simon said: “People want new housing but don’t want it on their green belt, they want it on someone else’s green belt. They want the land but don’t want the cost of cleaning up dirty land. We need to start those difficult conversations.
“And the most difficult conversation is with Solihull – which has the great bulk of the wealth and a huge pressure on land and has very expensive land.
“There’s a huge resistance to development on the green belt and resistance to ceding planning powers.”
Conservative Andy Street told the hustings audience he would only use green belt as a last resort and would instead invest in cleaning up brownfield former industrial sites for development first.