Statement by Nicholas Soames at the East Grinstead Post Referendum Campaign Group's Meeting on Wednesday, 13th April 2005

"Firstly, may I thank the PRG for arranging this meeting. I have had several meetings with the Group and I hope that I have been of assistance to them. This is the second public meeting I have attended on this and related matters. I have been much involved in this matter for many years. This is an issue of great importance to East Grinstead but we must remember that the Government's targets have implications throughout Mid Sussex and the wider county and its neighbours.

I am not against development; indeed I believe that it is suitable and necessary that there will be development here and we need affordable housing, but it must be sustainable, environmentally acceptable and containable and above all not excessive and it must protect the wonderful local character of Mid Sussex and this historic town.

What is proposed, in my judgement breaches all the Government's own targets for sustainability and has been rightly severely criticised by amongst others the Environmental Audit Select Committee which is chaired by my Parliamentary neighbour, Peter Ainsworth. The Committee has underlined the complete lack of joined up government in dealing with this important issue.

We have to fight this in a coherent, rational and professional manner and we must deal with the issues as they are.

I have backed the County Council to the hilt on this in their resistance to fight the Government's targets. You must remember that they went all the way to the High Court and we must understand that it is the Government who have imposed these targets and the County Council and District Council are now obliged to do this work through the Local Development Framework.

For Mid Sussex this could mean:-

45,000 extra people in Mid Sussex

11,000 extra children

8,000 extra school places would be needed

6,500 extra pensioners

21,000 extra jobs required

10,000 extra commuters

29,000 extra cars on the roads, with no guarantee of extra money for the A22, A264 and the M23 exit. I raised the question of the upgrading of exit 10 of the M23 with the Minister and I received a totally unsatisfactory reply - we cannot expect the developers to fund this in addition to a relief road.

15,000 extra tonnes of household waste per annum

6.75 million litres of extra water required for household use each day

Only 12 miles from here there are to be another 2,500 houses at Horley which are already being built without the necessary infrastructure and with the possible added threat of future development at Gatwick.

Incidentally how many of you here tonight have responded to SEERA's consultation on the draft South East Plan? The consultation ends on Friday 15th April - you must respond tomorrow.

So how should we present our case?

In three separate meetings with the Housing and Planning Minister, Keith Hill, I presented him with the petition of 10,000 local residents and the excellent piece of work commissioned by the District Council on infrastructure deficit in Mid Sussex, and in correspondence with the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and in my meetings with the Chief Executive and Chairman of SEEDA - I have most vigorously made the case not against development, but against the scale of development in a part of the world where the public services, water resources etc are already very under-funded.

It is inconceivable for the Government to impose these targets without a guarantee on the timing and level of investment.

I have consistently warned that a development of this scale must be supported by a relief road and a much improved infrastructure such as community and leisure facilities, schools and shops. The real danger, and something which the Planning Authorities have got to deal with, is the desperately serious trap that low employment areas with inadequate infrastructure and transport links, when taking on substantial new developments, cannot and do not create sustainable communities. Indeed it will run the risk of creating a high stress dormitory town to the detriment of the quality of life of local residents.

I have sought the assurance in writing, for what it is worth, from the Chief Secretary of the Treasury on infrastructure investment, and I have called for the Government to conduct an infrastructure audit and an audit of the funding of public services.

Now you must build the same case: not against development but against the scale proposed when the infrastructure can quite clearly not accommodate it.

We have inadequate water/electricity/waste/transport and roads and we already have an under-funded and overstretched health service. I have already made representations to EDF energy about the electricity supply in East Grinstead and to the Water Authorities about water capacity. We will need more schools, more dentists and more doctors and nurses.

On the question of the relief road I made representations to the Deputy Prime Minister back in 2002 over the need to adopt a holistic approach to this issue. As yet, no route alignments for the relief road have been considered in any detail. The County Council and Mid Sussex District Council have been gathering the environmental and traffic base data needed to inform the study and the assessment of the options. This data is being used to inform a multi-modal transport model so that a short-list of transport package options can be put forwarded. The first set of results from the model will hopefully be available in summer 2005.

So we will between us make the Government incorporate its own rhetoric on sustainable development into housing policy here.

We have a very good case and we need to make it.