Residents want public discussions on new housing sites

It follows the end of the public consultation into the council’s Housing Site Allocations Development Plan Document which outlines the council’s preferred sites for development.
The consultation resulted in more than 4,000 responses submitted in response to the thirty-six propsed housing sites, which included land for 125 dwellings off Bath Road, Speen, 87 homes on Lower Way, Thatcham, 105 dwellings on land off Clayhill Road, Burghfield Common and between 50 to 100 dwellings for land adjacent to junction 12 of M4 in Calcot.
The DPD also identified preferred sites for 14 permanent pitches for gyspy and traveller camps, and a further 24 plots for travelling showpeople in Padworth Farm (Rag Hill, Aldermaston), Clappers Farm (Beech Hill), New Stocks Farm (Paices Hill, Aldermaston) and the Circus Headquarters (Enborne).
Now, a further shortlist is being compiled by the planning policy task group, made up of 12 West Berkshire councillors, which meets in private.
The task group’s minutes remain confidential, leaving residents in the dark as to the task group’s thought processes when creating the shortlist, which will be presented to a meeting of the district’s full council on December 11 for approval.
If approved, a seven week consultation into the sites will be launched, the responses of which will be sent directly to the planning inspectorate.
A final list will be submitted to the Secretary of State for consideration in April.
One resident, who asked not to be named, but who would be affected by proposed developments in Speen, said: “It is impossible for local residents to have any idea how the task force came to their decision to forward a proposed site to the shortlist in relation to other sites.
“Surely, in a democratic society, local residents and tax payers would expect to have clear transparency of how a site has reached shortlist stage and assurance that there has been sufficient gathering of evidence-based data to support the recommendation.”
A recent letter submitted to the Newbury Weekly News by Theale’s Liberal Democrat councillor Alan Macro (Lib Dem) said: “My proposal was to open up the discussions on such important matters so that the public and the media could understand why particular site decisions are made.
Mr Macro, who is a member of the planning policy task group, said: “We have been assured that a special council meeting will be held to decide whether to make this important change. This is to ensure that the change can be made before final decisions are made on which of the housing sites are to go into the published plan.”
West Berkshire Council has not yet confirmed whether such discussions will be made public in the future. When asked why the task group met in private and why there were no minutes publically available, the council was unanble to provide an answer before the Newbury Weekly News went to press.
Regarading the public consultation, council spokesman Keith Ulyatt said the council was “extremely pleased” with the engagement of local residents during the consultation.
”There were literally thousands of responses which, as said, are now being analysed,” he said.