SHMA is no justification
The Draft Plan’s proposed ‘growth’ is based on a document called the SHMA. The SHMA is the evidence base which GBC housing targets are based on. The report’s statistics are distorted by large student numbers from Guildford University and has disproportionately increased the ‘need’ for houses. The Office for National Statistics
(ONS) downgraded Guildford’s population growth. The confidential commercial model used to calculate the SHMA numbers cannot be checked (because GBC do not hold the model), it has been taken on trust, this is not satisfactory to some councillors. On the 24 May, some Councillors raised these concerns regarding the SHMA produced by G L Hearn, (the most critical piece of evidence in the Draft Local Plan) but the majority vote indicated that the full council meeting was satisfied that the SHMA was ‘a professional document’!
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‘Limited Infilling’ in Normandy and Flexford
‘Limited Infilling’ is increasingly used by planning officers as a justification when approving applications in Normandy/Flexford, even where the site is outside the settlement area identified in the Local Plan and is therefore in the Green Belt. (It is worth recalling in this context that the Local Plan removed Normandy and Flexford, along with several other settlements, from the Green Belt, making then ‘inset’, rather than ‘washed over’; this meant that development within the settlement area would not need to accord with Green Belt policy.) We therefore thought it would be helpful to take a closer look at this concept of ‘limited infilling’ in the Green Belt.
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Report from 2023 NAG AGM
Our AGM took place on 31st October; the draft Minutes are attached. We discussed the unsatisfactory situation regarding the enforcement of local planning regulations, assisted by Councillor George Potter, the Lead Councillor for Planning at Guildford Borough Council (GBC).
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