Cllr blasts mayor over comments on homes application
ALABOUR councillor has criticised Labour mayor Marvin Rees for a ‘total abdication of duty’ in the saga of Brislington Meadows.
Cllr Tim Rippington was one of two Labour candidates who stood with Marvin Rees and local MP Kerry McCarthy on Brislington Meadows 20 days before May’s local council and mayoral election, and made the announcement that there would be no house-building on those fields.
Both Brislington East’s Labour candidates, and Marvin Rees, were elected and in the months since Cllr Rippington said he has tried repeatedly to firm up the announcement made that day.
The Mayor’s Office said it would not be responding to the statement and reiterated that the Mayor would be opposing Homes England’s plans.
The Brislington Meadows site had been first earmarked for housing in the 2014 Local Plan, and in early 2020, with a London property company stalling on a deal with the city council to get homes built there, Bristol City Council persuaded Homes England to spend £15 million to buy the land to speed up plans for 300 new homes, including 90 new council homes.
Thirteen months later, and with Homes England about to start consultation on the development, Mr Rees said he’d changed his mind and Brislington Meadows was too important an ecological site to have any homes built on it at all.
That U-turn surprised Homes England who now, seven months later, returned with an announcement last week that they are still going to try and get planning permission for a scaled-back housing development.
In a statement on the Brislington Meadows Facebook page, Cllr Rippington said he was told about the announcement by the mayor in April 2021.
“I assumed that this decision had been made in negotiation with Homes England, based on the impossibility of bringing forward a suitable plan for the area that would meet all the ecological restrictions,” he said.
“However, I found out almost immediately that Homes England
did not know that the announcement was forthcoming, and no such agreement was in place.
“Some people questioned whether the council had the power to stop the development, but I was informed on many occasions that it did.
“Since then, I have continued to raise this issue with Cabinet colleagues and the Mayor’s office and have always been reassured that the development would not go ahead – that it would be removed from the Local Plan and its future as meadows would be secured permanently.”
Homes England’s announcement on Friday, that it would be re-starting the consultation process to build new homes on Brislington Meadows, left Cllr Rippington dismayed. After the news broke on Friday, Mayor Marvin Rees said Homes England’s decision to do that was ‘disappointing.’
He said: “Brislington Meadows was allocated for housing in 2014 – two years before I was first elected as Mayor.
“More recent information shows the importance of the site for Bristol ecosystems and wildlife.
“That’s why we’re prioritising building on brownfield sites and pushing to protect green space.
“News of a planning applica
tion coming forward for Brislington Meadows is disappointing – but planning applications sit with cross-party councillor committees, not Mayors.
“While I disagree with Homes England’s decision to proceed with an application for Brislington Meadows, we must continue working together to build more new affordable homes elsewhere in the city,” he added.
But Cllr Rippington said he feels let down by the response from Mr Rees.
He added: “The response from the Mayor’s office has been, to say the least, disappointing. To say ‘planning applications sit with cross-party councillor committees, not Mayors’ sounds like a total abdication of duty considering the publicly made announcement by the Mayor during the election that the development would not go ahead.
“To me, this sounds like a total abdication of duty considering the publicly made announcement by the Mayor during the election that the development would not go ahead.
“I have spent the last few days trying to find out what avenues there are for preventing this application, but strangely many of those that told me with absolute certainty that it could be prevented have now started to hedge their bets.
“To say I feel let down is a massive understatement,” he added.
Homes England said its consultation process on its revised plans for Brislington Meadows is due to begin in late November.
❝ This sounds like a total abdication of duty considering the publicly made announcement by the Mayor during the election that the development would not go ahead. To say I feel let down is an understatement
Cllr Tim Rippington