Green Belt Proposals – More Information

On Friday (28 October 2016) the ten Greater Manchester Council Leaders will meet to agree the draft of the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework. Broadly the document sets out how the Councils propose to use land over the next 25 years to allow the city region to develop.

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As a starting point they assume Greater Manchester will have more people in it – 294,800 more people,  and want to provide space for an extra 227,000 new homes and space for an extra 199,700 jobs.

227,000 homes is a LOT of new homes, to give you an idea there are currently 75,868 homes in the whole of Bury.

The ten Council Leaders are the ten leaders of Greater Manchester Councils, that’s nine Labour politicians and one Conservative. Bury’s vote will be cast by Cllr Rishi Shori, the Labour Leader of Bury Council.

After the vote, residents will be consulted up to Christmas, with the consultation ending on 23 December 2016.

You can have your say in the formal consultation here.
Online at http://gmsf-consult.objective.co.uk or
By email to GMSF@agma.gov.uk
By post: Greater Manchester Integrated Support Team, P O Box 532, Town Hall, Manchester,
M60 2LA

You can download the whole report here (warning it is VERY large!)

Brownfield and Green Belt
The draft Spatial Framework DOES say that we should build as much as possible on existing ‘brownfield’ sites (e.g. former industrial sites), which is good, but it goes on to say that there should be a significant amount of ‘green belt’ land given up for development.

Green Belt is a planning policy developed since the second world war to ensure that green spaces are protected around our major cities. The idea is to stop cities expanding without control, that we all have access to the countryside, and that there are ‘green spaces’ retained between different towns.

Bury is especially rich in green belt land, over 60% of Bury is green belt. Our view is that this is one of the reasons that this area is such a great place to live, with all of us having easy access to green spaces. Green belt has meant that there has not been continuous expansion from the city centre. There is countryside between Bury and Radcliffe, between Prestwich and Middleton, etc.

The draft Spatial Framework takes the view that it is better to have a smaller number of large builds on the green belt, rather than a lot of smaller builds. Their argument is that this means the infrastructure can be built to support these developments. We are not so sure – it may be that smaller build sites would cause less damage.

Our view is that we DO need new homes. Everybody should have a decent place to live, but at present the the housing market is making home ownership difficult or impossible for many. However, we believe that every effort should be to build on existing brownfield sites FIRST. The Government has recently given local councils money to develop ‘Brownfield Land Registers’ to make sure the maximum use is being made of this land. We must also make use of existing planning permissions that have been given and are being ‘sat on’ by developers (often called ‘land banking’).

We also think that there should be more effort made to bring back empty homes into use. 12 of the top 20 local authorities with the highest number of empty homes are in the North West, which is a crying shame.

Building outside of city and town centres on green belt land is not only bad for the countryside, but it is also bad for the environment. Building on greenfield sites inevitably means that public transport services will be worse there than in town centres, and jobs and services will be further away. This means more cars on the road, more parking problems, more air pollution.

This map shows the green belt land to be lost if the Spatial Framework goes ahead (the areas in orange are green belt to be lost, the yellow is an ‘area of search’ in Bolton).  Although it is difficult to tell from the map in detail, it looks as though Bury fares the worst and will bear the brunt of the loss of green belt.

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The biggest areas to be lost would be in Prestwich around Simister and Bowlee; in Whitefield and Pilsworth around the M66, around Elton Reservoir between Radcliffe and Bury, around Walshaw road some smaller, but still significant, sites north of Bury.

Northern Gateway
Fundamental to the strategy and a big impact on Bury is the development of the ‘Northern Gateway’.

This is a large area of land, larger than Trafford Park in size, stretching from Prestwich and Unsworth eastwards towards Rochdale on both sides of the M62.

This is identified as a major site for employment and housing:

“The Northern Gateway provides a nationally significant growth area extending along the M62 motorway around its intersections with the M66 at Junction 18 and the A627 (M) motorways and at Junction 21 in the north-east of Greater Manchester. It offers an extensive range of high quality development opportunities in a strategically important location on the main route connecting Greater Manchester to Liverpool to the west, Leeds and Hull to the east and Lancashire to the north. The area also benefits from easy access to the City Centre, the main town centres of Bury, Rochdale and Oldham and the wider north Manchester area in general.“

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South of the M62 and M60 (between Prestwich and Simister, all around Simister, all around Bowlee and around the north of Middleton) would be for what is described as an ‘urban expansion’ with 3,400 homes. North of the Motorway would be more employment and industrial, though with a big housing development to the east of Whitefield.

We are totally opposed to this overdevelopment. This is the largest single loss of green belt proposed anywhere in Greater Manchester and would be a destruction of our countryside. There would be continuous built up urban development between Prestwich and Middleton, Whitefield and Middleton, Unsworth and Heywood etc. In fact you would be able to walk from Manchester city centre to the other side of Heywood without once entering countryside. Existing village communities like Simister and Bowlee would be lost forever.

One of the biggest problems we foresee here is transport. The area is, of course, well served by motorways, but as anyone who has ever been in a car can tell you, these motorways are FULL. Traffic is at a standstill every rush hour on the M60 and coming down the M62 into Manchester (and that was before the roadworks started). The report does identify that significant improvements will need to be made to Simister Island, to Junction 19 (M62) and Junction 3 (M66), but even with improvements we cannot see how more cars and lorries could be fit on the motorway.

Bury Labour’s U-Turn
The Labour Party in Bury has consistently promised that it will protect the green belt in Bury saying: “Bury Labour Group will defend the greenbelt and do all we can to stop development of this precious resource”. Read it for yourself in their manifesto for the 2014 local elections.

HANDS OFF Bury’s Green Belt
We are campaigning for the Spatial Framework to be changed so that it DOESN’T destroy the Green Belt. 

  • use brownfield sites FIRST
  • use existing planning permissions
  • bring empty houses back into use
  • focus development in existing city and town centres where public transport is better and less reliance on car journeys

If you agree with us, please sign our petition to send a clear message to Bury Council that the Green Belt must be saved. Get involved in the campaign on our Facebook Page – Hands Off Bury’s Green Belt.

Hands off our Green Belt – Sign the Petition

The local Lib Dem team across Bury are campaigning to save our precious ‘Green Belt’ land from development.

60% of Bury is green belt land. This is under threat because Greater Manchester Councils are considering proposals to provide the land to build up to 225,000 new houses over the next 25 years.

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Across Bury, developers have already proposed 70 sites with over 12,000 new homes. Most of these sites propose building on the green belt land that surrounds our towns and communities. More details of the proposals here.

We support the need for new homes, but NOT on the green belt. Greater Manchester has significant amounts of ‘brown field’ sites that should be used first for new housing. We particularly support the need the right types of new homes, such as more affordable homes.

On 28 October 2016 Greater Manchester Council Leaders will meet to decide which land they propose should be built on. Proposals should be published the week before.

Please help us send a clear message to the Council Leaders that Green Belt land should NOT be built on.

Sign our online petition to say HANDS OFF OUR GREEN BELT.

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Phoning for Witney

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This Thursday is polling day in the Witney by-election, and we need your help in the final stages of the campaign!

The support from across the North West has been amazing, with lots of people travelling down to Oxfordshire and also assisting from home or at the weekly by-election HQ at the ALDC offices in Manchester.

Lots of our newer party members have used the Witney by-election as an opportunity for some training, and this has been no different on the phones!

You can make a huge impact on the final election results by joining Lib Dem campaigners at ALDC from 1pm, Thursday 20th October at 23 New Mount Street, Manchester, M4 4DE. If you have never phoned before don’t worry, there is a friendly and experienced team on hand that will help you along the way.

If you can’t make it in person to the ALDC by-election HQ on Thursday, you can also make some calls from home – please email Louise at louise.bowe@aldc.org for further details.

Norman Lamb calls for the introduction of mental health first aid in the workplace

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Norman Lamb MP has called on the government to bring parity to mental and physical health by introducing mental health first aid in the workplace.

Speaking in the Guardian on World Mental Health Day (Monday 10th October) he said:

“It is estimated that one in four people experience a mental health issue in any given year, and that one in six employees is depressed, anxious or suffering from stress-related problems at any time. However, many of us know little about mental health. We often don’t spot the signs that a colleague, employee, or we ourselves are struggling, and this delays help and recovery.

Today, on World Mental Health Day, with support from Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) England and Mind, I am calling on the government to act and bring parity to mental and physical health in the workplace. I’m submitting an early day motion on the issue as the first step towards amending the current legislation, which requires employers to train staff in physical first aid, to in future include mental health first aid.”

Norman, who has recently become a mental health first aider himself, stated that mental health first aid “teaches people the skills and confidence to recognise the signs and symptoms of common mental health issues, listen empathetically and effectively guide a person towards the right support”. It is also hoped that introducing mental health first aid in the workplace will help businesses too, by reducing the number of employee sick days lost to mental ill health.

To find out more about mental health first aid, visit MHFA England.

World Food Day 16 October 2016

We’re supporting World Food Day, this Sunday 16 October 2016, coordinated by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation.

At present, almost 800 million people in the world do not have enough food to lead a healthy active life. That’s about one in nine people. About 21,000 people die every day of hunger or hunger-related causes, about one person every four seconds, most of whom are children.

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Climate is changing. Food and agriculture must too
Last year 193 countries pledged to end hunger in the next 15 years. The global goal for achieving Zero Hunger is 2030.

One of the biggest issues related to climate change is food security. The world’s poorest – many of whom are farmers, fishers and pastoralists – are being hit hardest by higher temperatures and an increasing frequency in weather-related disasters.

At the same time, the global population is growing steadily and is expected to reach 9.6 billion by 2050. To meet such a heavy demand, agriculture and food systems will need to adapt to the adverse effects of climate change and become more resilient, productive and sustainable. This is the only way that we can ensure the wellbeing of ecosystems and rural populations and reduce emissions.

Growing food in a sustainable way means adopting practices that produce more with less in the same area of land and use natural resources wisely. It also means reducing food losses before the final product or retail stage through a number of initiatives including better harvesting, storage, packing, transport, infrastructure, market mechanisms, as well as institutional and legal frameworks.

This is why the global message for World Food Day 2016 is “Climate is changing. Food and agriculture must too.”

More information and what we can do

This brochure has more information about the campaign.
This page has information that can be downloaded about tackling world hunger, including activity books for children.

Everyone has a role to play in mitigating the effects of climate change. Countries need to invest in sustainably increase food production, but there are also a number of actions that we can take to help. Find out more ideas here.

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Tim Farron attacks Government’s plan on foreign workers

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Commenting on plans unveiled by the government that businesses will be forced to reveal how many foreign staff they employ, Liberal Democrat Leader Tim Farron said:

“The Government’s plan on foreign workers is a nasty little policy that deserves to be thrown out on the rubbish heap. This threatens to further stoke the resentment that has seen increases in hate crime across our country. Only the Liberal Democrats are fighting to keep Britain open, tolerant and united.

This policy has also shown that Conservatives are now not the party of business, the Liberal Democrats are. But this issue is about more than that, it’s about what sort of society we are.

Instead of backing away from the fight, the Liberal Democrats will oppose this plan and stand proud in our belief that immigration benefits our culture, our economy and our communities.”

Lib Dems secure all-party support for Green Belt

Liberal Democrats in Bury have secured all-party support for a motion at Bury’s Full Council outlining the support of councillors to the principle of ‘Green Belt’.

Green Belt, introduced in various areas of Britain from 1955, as a planning policy to protect countryside around the countries largest urban areas.
· To check the unrestricted sprawl of large built-up areas
· To prevent neighbouring towns from merging into one another
· To assist in safeguarding the countryside from encroachment
· To preserve the setting and special character of historic towns
· To assist in urban regeneration, by encouraging the recycling of derelict and other urban land

For Bury this is very significant – 60% of Bury MBC has been designated as Green Belt land.

However we are concerned that this Green Belt land is under threat from the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework being developed by the ten Greater Manchester Councils to identify land for homes and jobs to 2035 – ultimately to provide land for another 225,000 homes in Greater Manchester over the next 25 years.

Liberal Democrat Group Leader Cllr Tim Pickstone said:
“Green Belt as an important Planning Policy which should be retained around our major urban areas going forwards.”
“In Bury we are very lucky, of not only having six great towns and many smaller communities, but also very lucky to have great green spaces between our built up areas. We do need more houses, but we believe that we should be looking first to the use of brownfield land for housing and jobs as a first priority.”

The motion proposed by the Liberal Democrat councillors received the support of Conservative and Labour councillors and is now the Council’s policy. Although the motion states the support of councillors to the principle of green belt, there is much more campaigning to be done on the issue when the proposals from Greater Manchester Council are published in the Autumn.

Liberal Democrat Federal Conference overview

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This weekend the Liberal Democrat Federal Conference gets underway in Brighton, running from Saturday 17th to Tuesday 20th September at the Brighton Centre.

It promises to be a busy and exciting event, with plenty of policy motions, fringe meetings and training sessions on offer.

On Saturday, highlights from the main hall include Safe and Free (liberty and security policy paper), An End to Homelessness policy motion, consultative sessions on nuclear weapons and sex work and a policy motion on adopting Pre-exposure Prophylaxis.

Sunday sees policy motions on Combatting Racism, UK and European Collaborative Research and Erasmus, Restoring Access to Justice and the Campaign to Save Parent Governors. On Monday there are policy motions on Europe, the Green Economy, and Mending the Net (a social security policy paper).

The final day of conference features a motion on Future Transport and speeches from party President Sal Brinton and the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron.

Don’t worry if you can’t make it to conference this year – you can keep up with all the news on twitter using the hashtag #ldconf. You can also watch coverage at home on BBC Parliament, starting Monday at 9:00am.

For more information about Federal Conference visit the Lib Dem website, or to view the full agenda please click here.

 

 

 

Reporting Back: Bury Council heading for £6.5 million overspend

Last week was the regular meeting of Bury Council’ Cabinet. A key point on the agenda was Bury Council’s financial outlook, which at present shows the Council heading for a £6.4 million overspend in the current financial year.

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This summary actually hides an even more worrying picture, with overspend in various areas totalling over £10.5 million but addressed partially met by savings or other income elsewhere.

The Council has drawn up an ‘Action Plan’ to partially address the issue (recruitment freeze, no new spending, etc etc), but this only amounts to around £1.5 million. The remainder of the overspend would need to be covered by spending the vast majority of the Council’s ‘free reserves’ (roughly £5 million, leaving the council with under £1 million left in ‘free reserves’ at the end of the year.

The point we raised at the meeting was whether the Council was ‘too optimistic’ when it set the budget back in February. Much of the overspend relates to:
– changes in the way services are delivered (e.g. changes are either taking too long to happen, or they are not delivering the savings that were expexted)
– income not as much as expected (for example income from parking, from leisure centres, from comercial rents are all down on budget)
– demand driven areas, such as adult care, or children in care, where costs are expected to be over budget.

The impact of this projected overspend could well be very significant. What it means for the Council is that for next year (2017-18) the starting position is that an extra £6.4 million of cuts will need to be found (it was going to be £11 million, now add £6.4 million to that). We are very worried on the impact this will have on services for residents.

A full copy of the report is here.