SAY NO TO URBAN SPRAWL OF SOLENT CITY (Eastleigh Liberal Democrats)

Eastleigh Liberal Democrats <enquiries@eastleighlibdems.org.uk>

SAY NO TO URBAN SPRAWL OF SOLENT CITY

October 22, 2008 11:30 AM

Eastleigh MP Chris Huhne told the Commons today that the Government's South East plan could create a "vast urban sprawl" from Totton in the west to Waterlooville in the East.

"We do not want a Solent city," said Mr Huhne. "My constituents prize the separate character of our local settlements like Hedge End, Botley, Bishopstoke, Fair Oak and West End. We do not want the strategic gaps between these villages and towns to go."

"If the Government's proposal to remove strategic gaps goes ahead, the green fields around our historic villages and towns will disappear and we will end up a vast urban sprawl stretching along the south coast from Totton to Waterlooville and taking in Southampton and Portsmouth. That must not happen".

Mr Huhne said there was a need for more housing for local people simply by virtue of later marriage, more divorce and longer lives, but the Government should not impose top-down targets based on population growth in the South East when the region was at the limit of environmental sustainability.

Mr Huhne pointed out that water resources per head of population were more scarce across the South East than in Sudan or Syria according to Waterwise, and that the Environment Agency had warned at a time of climate change about building more than 100,000 homes on flood plains.

Mr Huhne cited the Hampshire and Isle of Wight wildlife trust in arguing that increased population would mean more water abstraction from fragile eco-systems like the Itchen and the Test, chalk streams and salmon-spawning rivers recognised internationally for their environmental value.

"The density of population in the broader South East including London is now the highest in Europe, and is even more than the Netherlands. We are at the limits of environmental sustainability in the South East," said Mr Huhne.

Mr Huhne particularly raised the issue of the Strategic Development Area north and north east of Hedge End, and he said that the local residents in Botley and Boorley Green had been consulted less about this proposal than if a neighbour was planning an extension. "This is top-down planning at its worst," he said.