The Tandridge Local Plan submitted in January 2019 by the previous Conservative administration at Tandridge District Council has finally been found unsound by the Planning Inspector who examined it.
In a letter of 10 August to the council the Inspector Philip Lewis has advised the Council that he does not consider it is possible to make the plan sound and cannot recommend its adoption.
A central part of the Conservatives’ Local Plan was a “Garden Community” of 4,000 homes on Green Belt land at South Godstone. Delivery of the Garden Community hinged on improvements to junction 6 of the M25 and to the A22 and A264 Felbridge junction. Those improvements were reliant on a bid for £57m of funding from the Government’s Housing Infrastructure Fund.
Unfortunately, the funding was not agreed before the Plan was submitted and, in April 2020, the funding bid was rejected. There was no fallback position.
The Government stated the bid would not receive any funding because it “does not demonstrate sufficient value for money for the taxpayer...” and “due to the delivery risks stemming from the complex land assembly needed for the scheme.”
A consultant's report commissioned for the Local Plan by the council in June 2019, stated there were around 356 small plot owners who were sold plots on an investment basis, though they were sold without access. Most of the owners were believed to reside in India and Pakistan and it was likely that the Council would need to use its compulsory purchase powers to assemble the land for the Garden Community.
In December 2020, the Inspector wrote to the council setting out his serious concerns about the deliverability of the Garden Community which was so pivotal to the Plan. Nevertheless, he didn’t reject the Plan outright and allowed the council to continue with it and commission consultants to try to find a way to fund the necessary highway improvements. To date, no funding has been identified to mitigate the severe impacts of growth on the junction.
We have always been concerned that the Plan would fail because of the problems with the Garden Community and that, without an up to date Plan, all of the district’s Green Belt (and it is 94% Green Belt) would be at risk from unsuitable planning applications, some of which may get through at appeal.
In an attempt to avoid that, and the appalling waste of £3.5m of taxpayers’ money if the Plan is lost, we have worked hard to try to address the Inspector’s concerns by proposing amendments, including the removal of the Garden Community from the Plan, which we believed was a pragmatic solution. Council officers presented this solution to the Inspector at a meeting on 27 July.
We are extremely disappointed that the Inspector has not accepted it. We will continue to do everything we can to protect the district’s Green Belt.
