It’s time Labour started sticking up for the people
EARLIER this month, councillors in Bury rejected proposals to build 73 homes on a derelict site in Ramsbottom town centre - despite planning officers telling them they should approve it.
Councillors on Bury’s planning committee listened to the objections of residents, and an impassioned plea from a local councillor from Ramsbottom, to reject the advice of officers.
There’s a very real risk that the developer, Eccleston Homes, will appeal to the planning inspector, and they may well win.
But how refreshing to see local councillors on a planning committee taking a stand, and sticking up for the views of local people.
The site in question, the former Mondi Mill site, is derelict and something of a blight on the historic town centre of Ramsbottom.
And like Rossendale Council next door, Bury is under pressure to find enough sites to build new homes to meet Government housing targets. But that is where the parallels with how Rossendale Council deals with unpopular planning applications appears to end.
Time and again over the border in Rossendale, we’ve seen the Labour-led council back away from confrontation with developers, citing concerns that if they do stand up to them, they’ll just appeal to the planning inspector, which is an expensive business and a fight the council will probably lose.
As a result of that, there are whole communities in places like Edenfield and Helmshore who feel thoroughly fed up with the council, feeling let down and ignored too.
It’s a situation likely to get worse in Rossendale in years to come after Rossendale Council’s Labour group approved plans to make swathes of fields available for housing development in the years to come.
Combined with the planning committee’s approach of trying to avoid conflict with housing developers, Rossendale now is a pretty attractive place to come and build homes.
Local Labour councillors seek to suggest they are being financially prudent, and not wasting money on legal fights they can’t
win.
They also seek to blame the Government for tough housing targets.
It’s a well-worn argument, but local Tories, led by new leader David Foxcroft, are beginning to challenge.
He has argued that not only is the council not sticking up for residents, it’s also not helping
residents either.
Of the 300 homes built in Rossendale in the last three years, less than 10% are considered affordable housing.
So not only are we sacrificing countryside for new homes, which in turn put pressure one existing services like GPs, schools and so on, we’re also doing it for new homes many local
people won’t be able to afford. Cllr Foxcroft argues we’re pricing people out of
Rossendale as a result, and over time that risks Rossendale becoming a ‘commuter hub’.
That has the potential to be bad news for the area.
This is exactly the sort of opposition the Labour leadership should be
facing over its approach to planning and housing.
It’s high time the local Labour Party started listening to people’s concerns over housing developments and, more importantly, started doing like they are doing in Ramsbottom, and sticking up for local people.