Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council elects new leader
A new leader of Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council has been elected.
Simon Bound (Con, Sherborne St John & Rooksdown) – who has been acting leader since Ken Rhatigan stepped down from the role at the beginning of February for personal reasons – was voted in and announced his cabinet at a council meeting on Monday.
The new deputy leader will be John Izett (Con, Evingar), who will also be cabinet member for finance and property.
Mr Bound said: “I am proud to be heading up the council and to be at the helm of a strong team at a key time for the future of the borough and the services that we provide that people rely on every day.
“I have been elected as leader on the same night that we agreed a budget that invests in frontline services, including street cleaning and an extra waste collection crew.
“We have committed to up the pace of our drive to achieve our challenging climate change targets and enhance biodiversity.
“As we emerge from the pandemic, we are keen to support our amazing communities who have shown such resilience and empathy for others and to ensure this remains a thriving place with good jobs and great places to live.
“We will be focusing on taking action on the things that people have told us will make the most difference to their lives and are most important to them.
“We’ve done lots of listening and consulting and it is now time to get on and deliver.
“We need to take the right decisions and get things moving forward.”
The new cabinet will be as follows:
- Rebecca Bean – health, wellbeing and leisure
- Hayley Eachus – recycling, waste and regulatory services
- Tristan Robinson – homes and economy
- Mark Ruffell – natural environment and climate
- Jay Ganesh – planning and infrastructure
- Jenny Vaux – community development
Mr Bound will have the task of leading the council into its first election since its victory in last May’s full council election, when the Conservatives capitalised on the change in ward boundaries to secure 33 of the 54 seats.
A third of the council’s 54 councillors will be up for election this year – the 18 in each ward who received the fewest number of votes in last year’s election.
A key issue for Mr Bound and the new cabinet will be housing, as the borough council is tasked by central Government with building around 880 homes a year until 2039.
The council is currently unable to demonstrate a five-year housing land supply – the number of houses that could be built in the next five years to meet its target.
This has resulted in developers submitting optimistic planning applications for homes on greenfield sites and outside settlement boundaries, claiming that as the council is unable to demonstrate a five-year housing land supply, the development should be granted under the National Planning Policy Framework, which provides “a presumption in favour of sustainable development” in such situations.
