When: Friday 18 October 7.30pm
Where: Adastra Hall, Keymer Road, Hassocks BN6 8QH
Developers are seeking government support for a new town, the size of Burgess Hill right here.
IT WILL AFFECT YOU, potentially devalue your home and cover the countryside around Henfield, Woodmancote, Shermanbury, Twineham, Wineham, Sayers Common, Albourne, Blackstone, Hickstead & Hurstpierpoint. We must act now. Find out more about this vast proposed development.
Come and make your voice heard
Keynote Speakers:
- Nick Herbert MP Arundel & South Downs
- Nicholas Soames MP Mid Sussex
- Anthony Watts-Williams Locals Against Mayfield Building Sprawl (LAMBS)
Chair: Dr Roger Smith Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) Sussex
This meeting is jointly organised by CPRE Sussex and LAMBS Locals Against Building Sprawl
About this meeting
Campaigners say that developer’s plans will concrete over precious countryside, precious though not benefitting from any special protection which would provide some chance against the ‘development at all costs’ bias we are seeing in national planning policy implementation. Locals fear that this much loved landscape could be sacrificed to profit over proper planning.
Georgia Wrighton, Director of CPRE Sussex said “Neither plans being developed by Horsham or Mid Sussex District Councils identify the need for proposals being put forward by Mayfield Market Town Ltd, yet local democracy is in danger of being undermined by pressure being put to bear by company interests. The need for housing is undeniable in Sussex but how much, where and how that development is provided must be allowed to be debated locally, not foisted upon communities by have-a-go developers taking advantage of mixed messages from government. We are looking to government to show us that Localism works in practice.”
CPRE say that there is enough brownfield land to build 740,920 new dwellings in the southern regions (London, South East, and the South West) and that developers are holding onto land for 400,000 homes locked up in planning permissions not yet built in the UK. This public meeting follows a major conference held by CPRESussex in March ‘Futureproofing Sussex’ which showcased the CPRE national report ‘Countryside Promises: Planning realities’. The report analyses the way that the government’s planning policy, the National Planning Policy Framework has been applied since its introduction last year, highlighting that the views of local communities have been overruled time and time again with major new housing developments being allowed to sprawl across precious countryside.