I’m always incredibly busy fighting for the needs of our villages and residents. Often it involves a huge amount of cage-rattling and negotiating with many groups including Wiltshire Council officers, Cabinet, Wiltshire Police and our MPs. This month has been positive on several fronts.
Our Police & Crime Commissioner responded to my pleas for speed enforcement in Market Lavington by ensuring patrols came out to hold numerous speed check sessions recently. Speeds of up to 92mph in a 30mph zone were recorded by one Speed Indicator Device this year and, thanks to multiple police visits, this number has fallen dramatically. Wiltshire Police will continue to make regular appearances around the villages over the coming year.
I have also been lobbying hard throughout Wiltshire Police and Wiltshire Council for the adoption of ANPR cameras to equip parish and town councils with the means to independently deal with speeding. I am not a fan of speed cameras in open countryside, however, I am far less impressed by people hitting 90mph in a village during school pick-up time. It looks as though, after a lot of hard work, I have won the battle and Wiltshire Council will allow cameras to be fixed to existing posts to catch evidence of the most idiotic driving. The photos and calibrated speeds will be uploaded as evidence to Wiltshire Police for enforcement and parish councils also have the option of publishing photos of vehicles and speeds on social media.
Last week I met with parish councillors and our senior Highways engineer to look at possible improvements across the villages. Lots of good ideas were shared for making our roads safer. It was also useful to discuss what is not possible whilst being stood at various sites watching traffic movements. I will continue to support our parish councils in bringing requests forwards for Highways improvement funding.
To support Development, we have a “Core Strategy” document in Wiltshire by which we judge all planning applications to ensure building projects are in keeping with their environment, have infrastructure support, don’t overload roads or schools etc. Some of our villages also have a Neighbourhood Plan or a Conservation Area Statement to further build “local” perspective into Planning decisions. Sadly, a lot of our local priorities are thrown out because of a Government target known as the “5-Year Housing Land Supply”. Essentially, if we aren’t hitting this target in Wiltshire, our sensible and reasoned rejection of poor applications can be (and have been) overruled at appeal. Some large developers know this and sit on projects to restrict supply and keep us under the 5-year target. Manipulation of the housing supply means we end up with developments we don’t want. You can read more about this on my blog – dominicmuns.co.uk/5-year-housing-land-supply
Together with Cllr Philip Whitehead, I wrote a letter which is going out to all parish and town councils in Wiltshire for them to amend and send to their local MP. Danny Kruger has been briefed and will be handing letters over to Michael Gove asking for the 5 Year Housing Land Supply target to be scrapped. I aim to get this letter across to neighbouring authorities so that every parish in the country joins my campaign. I am optimistic that we can influence the Government to change this flawed system and protect our local decision making on how and where we build houses.
You may contact me about this or any other matter by email to dominic.muns@wiltshire.gov.uk or by phone on 07585 394 178.
