LETTER: Generous offer to Brighton council

Looking through the list of responses to the HDC Consultation, I noted a response from Brighton and Hove City Council (Mr Mike Holford) 27/06/2015 16.00hrs ProSub 2770 under ‘Chapter 2 Planning Context’. Apparently BH City Council is in support of the Policy. One of the many points in their response (IS IT OVER 200 WORDS? – if so we should say so) is as follows:
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Horsham District Council contacted the City Council on 9th April with an invitation to provide information as to how Horsham District could assist Brighton and Hove City Council in meeting its strategic needs. The City Council replied on 17th May with the comment that the City Council will inevitably be calling on adjoining authorities to help its housing need.

‘Constructive discussions have taken place between our authorities. Whilst the draft Planning Framework for Horsham District indicates that the District plans to accommodate some development to meet unmet needs from Crawley and other local authorities there is no indication from the published documents that specific consideration has been given to any of Brighton and Hove’s unmet needs. In this context the City Council would like to be informed of any further work the District Council might undertake on demography/housing requirements in the future’.

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So who wrote to Brighton and Hove City on 9th April making this generous offer? Was this done with the approval of the full council? We know that the Inspector will test HDC on its evidence to ‘co-operate’ across district boundaries with contiguous authorities – but Brighton and Hove are adjacent to Mid-Sussex not Horsham District Council.

Or was this just going through the motions to show the inspectorate that HDC had tested their ‘duty to co-operate’ to the maximum?

HDC won’t be able to meet its own stated annual target of 650 houses never mind if it took on some of the Brighton and Hove’s 40,000 target.

VALERIE WISE

Owlscastle Close, Horsham