Oldham Liberal Democrat Leader Councillor Howard Sykes MBE and his party colleagues will vehemently oppose the Places for Everyone plan when it is debated by Oldham Council at a special meeting on 28 July.
Oldham Council’s Labour Cabinet is expected to approve taking the plan to Council when it meets on 28 July, and Councillor Sykes and the Liberal Democrat Group will be leading the battle in Council to save Oldham’s green belt from the threat of housing development.
“Oldham residents should be in no doubt that Places for Everyone is simply the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework rebadged and repackaged. It contains the self-same fatal flaw – an assumption that it is right and necessary to build thousands of new homes on our precious and irreplaceable Green Belt and on other protected open spaces,” said Councillor Sykes.
“Liberal Democrat Councillors believe that it would be wrong, indeed I would say criminal, to build even one new home on any of our green spaces, when there are many brownfield land sites in Oldham town centre and in our districts that remain undeveloped and when we have empty homes, shops, pubs, offices and mills that can be repurposed as accommodation. I am confident that, if we stuck to these sites, we could meet our borough’s housing needs”.
The Liberal Democrats will be voting NO to adopting the Places for Everyone plan, and they instead want the authority to withdraw from the process and develop a local plan for the borough.
“This is a top-down plan forced upon Oldham by the Labour Greater Manchester Mayor and the leaders of eight other authorities in Greater Manchester,” added Councillor Sykes. “We want to follow the lead shown by our Stockport Liberal Democrat colleagues and withdraw from Places for Everyone and instead develop our own bespoke housing and commercial development plan with input from local people and communities that fits Oldham’s circumstances and meets its needs, based on the principle of brownfield development ‘first and always’”.
Oldham Council Planning Committee will consider an ‘all matters reserved’ application with regards to the proposal to build 400 houses on the former Very site on Thursday 22nd July 2021 which will purely look at access to the site from both the Beal Lane and Linney Lane entrances, Shaw.
The application is recommended for approval by Oldham Council Planning Department based on a report by Highway Engineers.
Councillor Howard Sykes, Liberal Democrat Councillor for the Shaw Ward said: “there are very mixed views in relation to the development of the site for housing. Whilst most welcome the use of the site for housing as an alternative to building on green space we also recognise that an increase in housing will bring additional pressures to Shaw not only on the roads, albeit part of this pressure will be offset by less heavy goods vehicles entering and leaving Shaw.”
“Our greatest concern is the impact that additional homes will have on the provision of health and education in our community, both of which are currently stretched with local people having to attend medical and educational facilities outside Shaw and Crompton already.”
“400 homes will bring more footfall to the town centre which is good for local traders however the council needs to recognise that health, education and leisure facilities are lacking in Shaw. This was also the very clear message from the public consultation on the development that was conducted last year.”
“A new integrated health centre is required in Shaw and is long overdue. In order for us to support this application when it eventually returns for full planning consent to build homes we, as well as the community, we will require a commitment that these facilities are part and parcel of the deal to develop the heart of Shaw otherwise we cannot support it.”
Leaders Question 1 – Doing our bit to save our planet
Madam Mayor,
My first question to the Leader tonight is on an issue that for my Liberal Democrat colleagues and I think is of paramount importance to the future of the people of our borough, and indeed the people of our planet.
I am, of course, referring to climate change and this Council’s ambitious targets to become carbon neutral in 2025 and make our borough carbon neutral by 2030.
Oldham cannot of course single-handedly save the world from climate change, but by taking practical actions to reduce our carbon footprint, and by leading by example, we can make a difference. Every little helps.
So, I was pleased to see in the recently published Covid Recovery Strategy reference to the ‘green recovery’.
But, unfortunately, when it comes to actions and targets the document falls short on specifics.
It references our intention to ‘develop plans’ for a new District Heat Network using renewable heat from disused mines underneath the town centre; to ‘start to deliver’ improvements in energy efficiency in social housing; and to ‘develop plans’ for Council corporate assets.
The mine heat project is something I personally welcome as I first suggested it to the then Leader at the October 2014 Council meeting, but sadly it must surely now be in jeopardy as the Government has failed to support the proposal as part of our Towns Fund bid?
But, in any case, this misses the real point.
In Bedford, as just one example, the Council also declared a climate emergency, identified its baseline level of carbon emissions, and by installing solar panels on its Council buildings, replacing street lighting with LEDs, and establishing a hydro power scheme in the Great Ouse River reduced its carbon emissions by 62%.
2025 is only four years away.
Would the Leader not agree that by now we as a Council should be ‘doing’ like Bedford and not just ‘planning’ and ‘starting to deliver’?
So, when are we going to start ‘doing it’?
Otherwise how are we as a Council showing leadership and providing encouragement to our public, social and private sector partners and our citizens to join us by doing their bit to stop climate change and save our planet?
Spend Local, Invest Local, Employ Local
For my next question, I want to return to a subject that I have previously raised in this chamber.
That is using the spending power of the Council and its partners to do greater good for our communities by employing it to purchase goods and services from local producers, suppliers and trades people, and to employ local people.
Of course, this creates a virtuous circle as local companies take on more local people, and both these companies and their people invest their earnings in our local economy, as do our residents who are Council employees.
Result – a more vibrant local economy and higher levels of local employment.
It is not rocket science, rather the reverse. Meerkat, TV celebrity and philosopher Alexandr Orlov would call it: ‘Simples’.
But for this to really work we need to ensure spending is placed with providers based in our district centres as well as in Oldham itself.
This strategy would reflect the new reality that I spoke of with the previous Leader at the September 2020 Council meeting suggesting now that ‘local is the new normal.’
For people are more likely to work from home, shop from home, socialise or engage in leisure activities at home, and where they venture out to spend more it is likely to be with local outlets.
They want their Council and its partners to reflect that attitude – to invest first and foremost in our borough by spending, but also investing locally, with traders and businesses in Chadderton, Failsworth, Lees, Royton, Shaw, and Uppermill amongst others to make these district centres also vibrant alongside Oldham.
Sometimes that may involve thinking ‘outside the box’, which is why I recently asked for consideration for an artisan farmers and producers’ market to be established in Shaw centre.
Can the Leader therefore please tell me?
How far off the current 60% target are we?
What this administration will do to increase our local spending by stages substantially above the current target of 60%?
What plans there are to spend and invest in our district centres as well as in Oldham?
And what plans there are to earmark more of our Council jobs and those of our partners for local people who live in our Borough?
What support are we giving local people so that can access these jobs be it at the council, health bodies, colleges and other public services?
We need to lead my example as it will be us locally who builds back better, and we need to do it for ourselves and it is clear nobody else is going to really help in a meaningful way.
Councillor Howard Sykes MBE, Leader of the Real Opposition, Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group Oldham Council.
Oldham’s Liberal Democrat Councillors have backed a call from the National Education Union to the government to end school summer holiday hunger.
The councillors have co-signed a letter to the Prime Minister seeking the return of a special payment to poorer families of £15 per week for each child normally in receipt of means-tested free school meals. This is to provide families with extra food to compensate them for the loss of free school meals for that child during the summer holidays.
Commenting, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE said: “Last year, the government finally listened to the many voices, including ours, calling for an end to kids going hungry over the summer and did the decent thing by introducing this payment whilst Britain was in the grip of the COVID pandemic.”
“We are not out of the woods yet and things are still very tough financially for a great many people, especially in a poor place like Oldham. Making these payments again this year would not only be the right thing to do – it would be the humane thing to do as well. If the Prime Minister is serious about ‘levelling up’- Britain, then he needs to start by making sure none of Britain’s children goes hungry”.
Dear Prime Minister, CC: Chancellor and Education Secretary
We write to you today because we believe action to counter food insecurity for children is urgent and can’t wait. There are 1.7 million children eligible for Free School Meals (FSM) in England. Over half a million of those became eligible for FSM between March and December 2020 as the economic impact of Covid-19 took effect.
Food insecurity is a part of everyday life for many children eligible for FSM, and for those growing up in poverty in the UK, this bites particularly hard during periods of school closure.
The public have made their support for ensuring children receive FSM in the holidays really clear. More than one million people signed Marcus Rashford’s petition last year calling on Government to expand eligibility and access to Free School Meals.
Over the course of the pandemic the Government sensibly acknowledged the shocking reality of holiday hunger by expanding the FSM voucher scheme to include the Easter and summer holidays in 2020, as well as the week of the May half-term. And while the expansion of the Holiday Activities and Food Programme is welcomed, it has limitations. Local authorities are only able to provide support to families for four days a week, across four weeks of the holiday, which is equivalent to 16 out of 30 weekdays.
We urge the Government to re-introduce the scheme implemented during previous school holidays, in which families were allocated £15 per child every week, to cover the entirety of the upcoming six-week summer break.
Come September, many children will come back to school hungry, malnourished and unable to concentrate. The Government has pledged to ensure that students from disadvantaged backgrounds aren’t left behind – but a lack of regular, dependable nutritious meals has a huge impact on learning and engagement when children and young people return to school.
Government must act now – before the end of term – to confirm the direct funding for provision of the Free School Meals voucher scheme for eligible children over the summer holidays, to leave no child behind. School leaders need clarity as soon as possible.
This attack is appalling. It is a frightening attack on an individual, but it is also demonstrates the threat to people in public life and stops decent people from being involved in it.
This cannot be allowed to continue, and not only must we stop this criminal attack, but also the abusive approach that has been too much of the politics in Oldham recently, and the UK, in recent years.
Everyone deserves to be treated with dignity, with respect, and with fairness. Abuse and “dog-whistle” politics can have no part in our society.
This is a time when we must stand together. If you are a decent, fair-minded person, you must stand up against this appalling attack, and defend the values of our country – honesty, decency and fairness.
Oldham Liberal Democrat Group Leader Councillor Howard Sykes MBE wonders if a recent huge fire which destroyed a waste handling facility on Mossdown Road, Heyside, Oldham will end the plan for a new incinerator.
Councillor Sykes was full of praise for the firefighters: “As always to their immense credit our firefighters responded magnificently in bringing under control the massive blaze without loss of life, but the plant is now destroyed.”
“The business model for a new incinerator, called officially an energy recovery facility as it would generate electricity through burning rubbish, was based in large-part on the supply of waste from the now-destroyed waste handling facility,” added Councillor Sykes. “Will this mean then that Synergy’s plan for an incinerator will be put on hold?”
“For my constituents and for me this would be an enormous relief. This is just not the right site. The local community would be massively affected by the increase in heavy truck traffic travelling to and from the site, and we all share grave concerns about the negative impact on public health that would result from the air pollution generated through burning millions of tons of waste on site every year”.
