Cllr Pearl Lewis

On Wednesday 8^th September 2010, Council revoked our Core Strategy that had been submitted in October 2009. As it was based so heavily on the now withdrawn South East Plan which was part of the Regional Spatial Strategy, it was no longer relevant to have our housing and growth plans as submitted in the strategy. A change of national government means that we now have the opportunity to decide our own growth plans, rather than have them imposed on us. This is a very exciting time for Aylesbury Vale, and there was jubilant celebration in the chamber from over 100 members of the public that had attended when the motion was passed with 100% support from Members.

I am excited that I am now able to go back to my parishes and ask them to start thinking about the levels of housing and infrastructure that they would like to see in their areas. I think Parish Plans are the best way to achieve this, and I will be helping parish councils work with AVDC to produce these. It is important that local people consider what their priorities for housing, infrastructure, employment and demographics are going to be. We should embrace this opportunity to be able to have a say about the location and number of houses we have in the Vale.

A number of important points were raised at the meeting which we must take note of when forming a new plan. The threat from Milton Keynes is a very real one, we should make sure that any new development is thoroughly considered in relation to infrastructure, we should aim to be as consultative and transparent in our future decision making about housing as possible, we should take note of the inspectors comments already given relating to a number of housing developments in the Core Strategy, and employment targets and sustainable development consideration are absolutely key in any new plan.