Opinion: Local Plan – Not Enough Ambition, Not Enough Vision

Published on: 30 Jul, 2017
Updated on: 1 Aug, 2017

By Brian Creese

Guildford Labour Party

In what seems to be an endless process, the deadline has just passed on yet another iteration of the Local Plan.

But the Guildford Labour Party feels that once again, the draft plan shows that Guildford Borough Council’s ambition is limited and its vision sadly lacking. The document, lacking coherence, feels like a set of compromise.

The bottom line remains that we are in desperate need of housing, both social and private for the people of Guildford Borough. Nurses, police officers, teachers, retail workers, bus drivers and a raft of other professionals in average income jobs that support the borough’s struggle to find affordable accommodation within the town.

The plan talks much about “affordable housing” and while this includes social housing the plan does not identify social housing as a particular priority. Where the plan demands 40% affordable housing Guildford Labour Party would like to see the figure at raised to 50%, half the total.

As for student accommodation, we support purpose-built accommodation. The key thing is that student accommodation needs to be expanded beyond the University of Surrey to include other academic institutions such as Merrist Wood College, the Academy of Contemporary Music, Guildford School of Acting and the University of Law.

All the higher education institutions need to address the housing needs of their students.

Overall we should be considering house density, not the number of houses. We need to look at how many people live there, not how many houses we build. And we need to ensure that all houses are built to a good standard. Labour supports mandating the “Build for Life” standard for all houses.

When it comes to Guildford town centre, Labour would like to see far more support for small independent local businesses to maintain the heritage and distinctive character of Guildford. Labour also thinks that all measures for carbon reduction must apply equally across the board and no distinctions should be made between housing and retail.

And finally, public and community transport should be central to the Local Plan to alleviate congestion and minimise harmful emissions. At best. the draft plan pays lip service to these needs and shows no serious ambition to create extensive, safe cycling routes and take innovative approaches to encouraging greater use of buses.

George Dokimakis, chair of Guildford Constituency Labour Party commented: “The work done by the council on the plan is commendable but unfortunately it does not go far enough. So at best we can only raise only one cheer for the revised plan which seems to shy away from the sort of innovative and decisive policy ideas which Guildford desperately needs.”

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