Local Plan will be 'disastrous' if adopted, says environmental campaign group Calderdale Friends of the Earth

In a critique of findings reached by supervising Government-appointed Planning Inspector Katie Child – who said she would find the plan “sound” providing a number of modifications are made – and council methodology in developing key proposals, Friends of the Earth argue it will be “unsustainable”.

Calderdale Friends of the Earth co-ordinator Anthony Rae said: “If you reflect on all the flaws in the Local Plan described in our briefing, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to describe it as disastrous for the future of Calderdale.

“If councillors vote to adopt it, they will have to bear responsibility for all that follows.”

The group is circulating its critique to all councillors, with Cabinet next Thursday (March 2) likely to recommend to the full Calderdale Council that members should adopt the controversial land use blueprint when they meet on March 22.

Friends of the Earth (FoE) says its document examines the credibility of key and controversial proposals – that by 2033 Calderdale’s population should increase by 22,000, with 15,000 new houses, and 10,000 new jobs by 2030.

The group questions modelling techniques used to arrive at these numbers and claims two of them – for proposed population and jobs growth – were not included in the version of the Local Plan submitted for public consultation in August 2018.

This contravened Government requirement that a wide section of the community should be involved to ensure the Local Plan reflects a collective vision and “a set of agreed priorities”, argues FoE.

Mr Rae said: “How could people in Calderdale, and in communities particularly affected by an inflated housing growth target which will result in the loss of protected green belt nearby, actually comment on what should be ‘a set of agreed priorities’ for the future of Calderdale when they never knew anything about them, because the council didn’t include them in the published plan?”

FoE criticises councillors over supervision of how these were added later in the process, says the group.

The campaigners say they believe none of the three targets will ever be realised in the future but the loss of green belt to housing will take place and “that loss will be permanent.”

Government has since said compulsory housebuilding targets previously set were only advisory and guidance says green belt should not be changed if that is the only way a council is proposing to meet the housing target it proposes, says the group.

Mr Rae said: ‘So not only will the Local Plan be destructive, it’s pointless as well.”

He said FoE, which took part, and argued these points in, many hearing sessions overseen by Ms Child before withdrawing over a data access issue, believes the Local Plan will “probably” undermine Calderdale’s Climate Action Plan.

The Local Plan identifies sites where up to 10,000 new homes might be built into the 2030s, and also sites for economic growth.

Proposals have been controversial particularly in south and eastern parts of the borough including Brighouse, where two large Garden Suburbs together comprising around 3,000 new homes are proposed; Greetland, Hipperholme, Northowram and Shelf, where numbers of new homes are likely to be highest.

Campaigners’ concerns include infrastructure and environmental, including air quality, issues.