Councillors approve City Plan despite protests aimed at saving wildlife sites

Despite protests, a new 10-year planning blueprint for Brighton and Hove was voted through last night (Thursday 20 October).

The City Plan Part Two sets out planning policies – for housing, commerce and the environment – intended to reflect local priorities in the years to 2030.

The most controversial aspects of the new plan involved the inclusion of green spaces on Brighton and Hove’s “urban fringe” as suitable for housing.

There are fears that more than 900 homes could be built on 16 sites on or near the edge of the South Downs.

And these choices dominated the debate when Brighton and Hove City Council met to approve its strategic development plan.

Campaigners fighting to save parts of Benfield Valley, in Hangleton, from being earmarked for housing protested outside Hove Town Hall before the meeting of the full council.

Some of them were in the public gallery as councillors voted through the policy, by 29 votes to 10, with one person yelling: “Our green spaces are not protected.”

The council refused to receive a petition on the Change.org website – signed by almost 5,000 people – saying that councillors could not choose to exclude the site.

Whitehawk residents who hoped to fight to save a butterfly bank in Swanborough Drive were also denied a their say at the meeting.

The Conservatives voted against adopting the plan. Tory councillor Robert Nemeth put forward three amendments, with options such as rejecting the plan to expressing concern that petitions and deputations were not heard.

The third option, which councillors also rejected, sought an urgent report about the council’s approach to urban fringe sites as a land owner.

Councillor Nemeth said: “Why are we against the inclusion of these sites? Quite simply, they’re irreplaceable. They’re packed full of nature – billions upon billions of creatures will be killed if they’re developed.

“Flora and fauna on each (are) highly prized. They are magical amenity spaces around the dense city. They were precious before covid descended, even more precious now.”

Green and Labour councillors voted against the Conservative amendments – as did all but two of the Independent councillors – Tony Janio and Bridget Fishleigh.

Conservative councillor Dawn Barnett, who represents Hangleton and Knoll ward, said that residents were “furious” about the council earmarking Benfield Valley for housing.

She said: “The Sussex Wildlife Trust, in particular, are disgusted with what the council has done and cannot understand why they have done it.

“One of the worst aspects of all of this is that the council is refusing to even hear what residents have to say.”

Councillor Barnett said that a lease on the land, signed in 1992, stated that no alterations or additions could be made or any additional buildings built on it.

When the West Hove Sainsbury’s superstore was built, she said, the former Hove MP Sir Tim Sainsbury “gifted” the land to the council with a covenant to protect it from development.

Green and Labour councillors repeatedly said that government-appointed inspectors required the council to find more sites for new housing, including parts of the Whitehawk nature reserve and Benfield Valley.

Labour councillor Amanda Evans said that she sympathised with the campaigners as she felt that most councillors agreed with them.

But she accused Conservative councillors of “grandstanding for leaflet copy” for next year’s council elections.

Councillor Evans said: “Government inspectors enforced national planning guidelines to always ‘presume in favour of development’.

“Government hearings and government rules. Many residents and groups of objectors have made representations about why particular sites should be removed from the plan, only to have those representations – with the exception of one small site in Patcham – rejected by government inspectors.”

Councillor Evans added that thousands of public representations were put before the government inspector after four public consultations – and they still required the urban fringe sites be included in the city plan.

Green councillor Leo Littman, who chairs the council’s Planning Committee, said that numerous planning inspectors had insisted on including green spaces in the plan.

He said: “In return for protecting 93 per cent of our urban fringe, the government inspectors insisted on us sacrificing the other 7 per cent.

“We have no choice in it. If we tried to remove the urban fringe sites, the whole plan will collapse and the entirety of our green space would be at risk of development.

“As much as it pains us as Greens, the Tory government has left us with no choice in it.”

Independent councillor Peter Atkinson, who represents North Portslade, said that he would like Benfield Valley taken out of the City Plan but councillors had been told that picking and choosing was not an option.

Councillor Atkinson said: “To pretend otherwise is to give residents and campaign groups false hopes which is cruel and seriously misleading.

“We also need to remind everyone that most of the brownfield sites in the city are not owned by the council.

“People say: ‘why don’t you build on the brownfield sites?’ The answer is: ‘We’d like to but we need to buy them first.’ And that would be financially impossible.”

The City Plan identifies seven strategic sites, including Brighton General Hospital, in Elm Grove, the engineering depot, in New England Road, land in Lyon Close, Hove, and the Sackville Trading Estate and coal yard in Hove, where more than 800 homes have been given planning permission.

The plan also includes 39 brownfield sites which are expected to provide at least 1,570 new homes as well as business opportunities.

Policies in the plan include restrictions that will apply to new houses in multiple occupation (HMO), also known as shared houses or – not always accurately – student houses.