Two days after Winchester City Council rejects release of four local reserve sites, developers get go ahead to build on first of them...

12.05.00pm BST (GMT +0100) Wed 21st Oct 2009

On Wednesday, October 14, 2009, in a packed meeting, Winchester City Council's Conservative Executive decided to apparently reject the release of the council's local reserve sites (Pitt Manor, Francis Gardens, Little Frenchies Field in Denmead, Spring Gardens in Alresford) for development.

At the time, one of the sites - Francis Gardens in Abbots Barton - was the subject of a planning appeal by developers who wished to develop the site - and due to be heard on December 1, 2009.

At a meeting in private between Conservative Councillors and council officers on Thursday or Friday, October 16, 2009, the Council then decided to give up its defence of the appeal - effectively giving the Francis Gardens site the go ahead for development.

Liberal Democrat Prospective MP, Martin Tod, attended the Cabinet Meeting where the decision not to release local reserve sites was made:

"To put it mildly, the decision to give the go ahead to build on Francis Gardens is inconsistent with what was being said only two days earlier.

The Conservatives' die-in-the-ditch defence of the local reserve sites appears to have lasted less than 48 hours...

The obvious question is whether they can be trusted to defend any of the other sites, given their failure to defend this one.

This whole situation also highlights the madness of the current top-down planning system. It remains a big problem that central government can issue guidelines that overrule local judgement of how many houses we have in the pipeline.

It's another reason the Lib Dems are committed to scrapping the current system of central housing targets."

Local ward Councillor, Jim Maynard, commented:

"I have been involved for some years arguing successfully up to now alongside local residents against development. Many at the Council have been resigned to development for some time and only the efforts of the residents and local councillors have prevented it.

I do not think the Conservatives have made any great effort to resist this development as I do not think there is any political will on their part to do so.

I note that the leader is now planning to have a meeting with "the relevant minister" to try and do something about the other reserve sites only when it's too late to do anything about Francis Gardens.

We said at the last election that a Conservative council would lead to early development at Francis Gardens and, sadly, it seems we were right."