BUILDING new houses and offices in and around our town has to go hand-in-hand with improved local services.

For the past decade, this has not happened, and, as a result, Basingstoke is suffering from an "infrastructure gap".

My week has been dominated by dealing with the consequences.

  • ON FRIDAY, I joined Old Basing residents for their third week of campaigning against the volume and speed of rat-run traffic using the narrow village lanes.

The county council estimates that 50 per cent of this traffic is destined for the Chineham Park and Daneshill business areas of the town.

The money to build a new rail station in Chineham was never forthcoming. Many are, therefore, left with few options other than to use their car to travel to work.

The Black Dam Roundabout is operating well over the capacity for which it was designed and is a notorious congestion black spot.

It is, therefore, unsurprising that drivers look for other routes to reach their place of work.

Solutions have to be found to ease the current problems in Old Basing and many other residential areas of the town.

Further development, particularly in Basing View, has to be carefully matched with money to increase the capacity of roads into the town if we are to prevent this problem from worsening.

  • OVER the weekend, rain caused extensive flooding in Old Kempshott Lane, Buckskin.

Developers have recently started building more than 300 houses on adjacent fields.

Muddy water ran straight off these churned-up fields, which are a natural soakaway for the area, into nearby residential property, causing a lot of damage.

An underground spring makes the area akin to a flood plain and this was an issue raised by local residents when development of the site was originally proposed - but permission to build was still granted.

I have called for the new building works to be halted until a proper solution to the drainage problem is found.

  • ON A more positive note, I am pleased that the borough council has now secured money from the Government to undertake a proper audit of the gaps in local services. But I fear the more difficult job will be to secure the money to make the improvements that are required.
  • CALL Maria at the House of Commons on 0207 219 5749, e-mail miller@parliament.uk or write to her at The House of Commons, London, SW1A 0AA.