By Carmelo Garcia – Local Democracy Reporter
There is frustration that the Government is not budging on a huge housing target which “risks changing the character of the Cotswolds”.
Council chiefs are in the process of creating a new blueprint for development in the Cotswold district after being tasked to find land for around 18,650 to 18,900 new homes to be built over the next 20 years.
Cotswold District Council’s target has more than doubled from under 500 to more than 1,000 a year.
And their draft proposals will see 90 per cent of this housing built in ten strategic sites and deliver major expansions to existing towns and villages alongside the creation of new settlements.
The proposals are hugely controversial in the affected areas and would lead to a roughly 40 per cent increase on the 44,000 homes in the district today.
House prices in the district are around 14 times average earnings and since the target changed, the district’s five-year housing land supply has dropped from 7.3 years to 1.8 years. And the council believes this has opened the door to speculative applications.
More than 80 per cent of the district lies within the Cotswolds National Landscape, so planners are suggesting that most new development must go into the remaining 20 per cent, of which four per cent includes flood plain and cannot be built on.
But South Cotswolds MP Dr Roz Savage and council leader Cllr Mike Evemy (LD, Siddington and Cerney Rural) have been calling on the Government to lower the housing target for the Cotswolds.
They met recently with Baroness Taylor of Stevenage, the minister for housing and local government, to argue that point.
However, they said the target still stands. In her written reply and at the meeting, the minister said that her quasi-judicial role in the planning system meant she could not comment on the specifics of the Cotswold Local Plan.
She said the Government expects every area to play its part in tackling the housing crisis. Any case for a lower figure, she said, must be made with evidence to the independent planning inspector when the plan is examined.
“I’m disappointed,” Roz Savage said. ”My constituents have been clear that 18,000 new homes is too many for a district where four-fifths of the land is protected landscape, and I took that message directly to the minister. She listened carefully, but the Government has not moved on the number.
“Nobody here is arguing against new homes. We urgently need homes that local families, young people and key workers can actually afford.
“Building on this scale, squeezed into a fifth of the district, without the roads, GP appointments, school places and sewage capacity to support it, risks changing the character of the Cotswolds without giving local people the homes they need.
“In Down Ampney, Thames Water is already discharging sewage into Ampney Brook, yet the village could grow fivefold. The concerns residents raise with me are credible and deserve to be taken seriously.
“There were some encouraging signs. The minister agreed that housing growth must not outrun water infrastructure, and I will hold the Government to that.”
Cllr Evemy said it was good to finally meet with a minister after three previous requests to meet with one.
“However, while the minister was polite and listened to the points that Roz and I made, she wasn’t prepared to consider lowering the Government’s housing target which is forcing us to plan for many more homes than the district can reasonably accommodate,” he said.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has been approached for comment.
The local plan’s regulation 19 consultation has been extended and now runs until November 3, 2026. Residents can comment on whether the plan is sound and legally compliant, and the minister encouraged local people to make their views known.
Anyone who responds can also ask to be heard by the inspector at examination.