THE MP for Basingstoke has called on the council to get house building under control and said that Basingstoke has “consistently over-delivered on houses”.

As part of her regular series of community meetings, Basingstoke MP Maria Miller and residents met with members of the Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council including the council leader Cllr Simon Bound to discuss the best plan for housing in Basingstoke last night (June 23).

As previously reported government calculations suggest as many as 17,820 new homes need to be built in Basingstoke and Deane by the end of 2039 and council documents reveal that Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council (BDBC) need to build 7,703 houses more than they currently have in the pipeline.

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It's part of the update process of a document called the local plan, which sets the rules surrounding the development of the borough and can be used by developers as a blueprint on where and how to build houses.

At a meeting of the borough council’s economic, planning and housing committee in September 2021, councillors unanimously voted in favour of rejecting the number of new homes, which is set under the government’s standard methodology procedure.

It has since been revealed that the figures had been calculated using the Standard Method, which use data which is 13 years out of date.

Ms Miller said: “Basingstoke has historically been the biggest builder of houses in the country, and we have consistently over-delivered houses against even what are target has been and now we have levels which are double those of some of our neighbouring, very similar authorities like Woking.

“I am not going to try and draw any allusion that I am impartial on this because I am not, I think that the council needs to be thinking very carefully about how we get house building under control. I want them to be able to set out their plan.”

Cllr Simon Bound said the council has a responsibility to “run the process” with a primary objective to decide what goes where.

He said: “As far as the vision goes, we would like to see a place where as far as the borough is concerned it is prosperous and thriving, connected and vibrant, environmentally responsible and distinctive."

During the meeting, concerns were raised about the infrastructure of the town centre.

Cllr Bound added: “We are quite bad at zooming the town centre so lots of things are all over the place and its stretched quite a long way over the Top of Town.

“I think we really struggle and we need to reclaim the high street and work out what it is. People want more green spaces and we talk about buildings rather than those green spaces.”

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Cllr Malcolm Bell, vice chairman of Bramley Parish Council raised concerns.

He said: "We all know the infrastructure of this area is incapable of taking the volume of houses we have proposed at the moment.

“We are not against building but we want the quality of life of the residents to be improved not deteriorated and this is happening every day."

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