Candidates have been announced for the upcoming by-election in the Wokingham Borough of Shinfield, the results of which could give the Lib Dems an overall majority. In May 2024, the Lib Dems secured 27 councillors, while the Conservatives held onto 19 and Labour eight. Now, a by-election for Shinfield has been set for Thursday December 5th, after the resignation (for personal reasons) of former Labour councillor Sarah Bell.
Some very clear divisions have appeared between the candidates regarding the proposed 3,930 houses proposed for the Loddon Garden Village (formerly 4,500 houses at Hall Farm). I feel it would be helpful to potential voters to make those differences clear, particularly given the history of this issue in Wokingham, and the fine balance that exists in terms of seat numbers on our local Council.
One candidate has taken a very strong stand AGAINST building more houses in the South of Wokingham (on top of the 4,000 already built at Shinfield and the 3,500 already built but still being added to at Arborfield Green). That candidate is Jackie Rance and she is the Conservative candidate. As she says in her flyers, "Fight against the LibDem plans for 3,900+ houses at Hall Farm". Yes, it was the Conservatives under John Halsall who first introduced the idea of a major new Strategic Development Location (SDL) at Hall Farm, back in 2021, under their "Right Homes, Right Places" initiative.
However, that plan was never moved beyond what is known in planning parlance as the Regulation 18 (Public Consultation) Stage. We have now had over 2 years of LibDem control in Wokingham.
In the 2022 Wokingham Borough Council election a total of 64 candidates contested the 18 seats. The Conservative Party under John Halsall lost overall control of the council, but remained the largest political group. The LibDems under Clive Jones were at this point supportive of our campaign to fight the houses at Hall Farm (as evidenced by the photo below showing Clive holding one of our placards).
After the 2022 election, Wokingham Borough Council became "No Overall Control", meaning no single party had sufficient seats to claim a majority. Consequently the "Wokingham Borough Partnership" was formed from the 23 Liberal Democrat Councillors, 3 Labour Councillors and 2 Independent Councillors. Together, they collectively agreed to work together in the best interests of the residents. Far be it from me to speak for others but the two Independents, Gary Cowan and Jim Frewin have nothing positive to say about how they were manipulated, bullied and deceived by the LibDems.
2022 was the last election fought under the old rules with the old ward boundaries. In 2024 all seats across the borough were up for election, rather than just 1/3 of seats. The main impact of the boundary changes is that all wards in the Borough are now three member wards, but the number of seats remained the same at 54.
Which brings us to the current situation. At the 2024 election the Liberal Democrats made a net gain of one seat, giving them exactly half the seats on the council, leaving them one seat short of a majority. This makes Shinfield a VERY important vote for the LibDems to try and win. If they were to win Shinfield they would finally gain an overall majority in Wokingham.
When Gary Cowan and Jim Frewin held seats they were able to exert some moderation, even influence on the Lib Dems. It is also fair to say the Lib Dems made some efforts to get the national (then Conservative) government to change the demands being placed on Wokingham for house building, under what are some very unfair rules contained within the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). However, it is also fair to say they did nothing about moving the Local Plan forward when they had the time, and now we are up against some uncomfortable deadlines they are panicking. This is what's behind all the "we must have a local plan to prevent ad hoc development" scaremongering.
It is true that without a proven 5 year land supply we could be subject to a "presumption in favour of sustainable development". This is the so called "tilted balance" This does not mean we have to be railroaded into accepting an UNSOUND plan. Particularly one that inflicts 30 years of construction misery on us. For a summary of our objections to this plan take a look HERE. However, these arguments are largely academic as the plan will be decided by the Inspector next year, where we may finally get our objections heard after over 3 years of waiting! (The first Green4Grow Blog post was September 23rd 2021).
As a group SOLVE Hall Farm met with the LibDems in 2022 to put our case for considering alternatives to Hall Farm. We also held a petition in 2023 to try and get a debate on building at Hall Farm. Shown below is then leader of the Council, Clive Jones, accepting our petition. No debate, no change, no surprises either really. By this point it was becoming clear, the green fields between Shinfield, Arborfield, Lower Earley and Winnersh were the sacrifice the LibDems were prepared to make. Contrast the views expressed by the current Lib Dem Leader Cllr Stephen Conway (Twyford) when commenting on development near his ward. "Councillor for Twyford, Ruscombe and Hurst, Stephen Conway said at the discussions over the development that it would effectively create a new settlement that would be cut off from Twyford making daily travel difficult". Excuse me but what will 3,930 houses at Hall Farm do?
Then there was a change of national government to Labour in the 2024 General Election and even higher housing demands being placed on Wokingham under a new NPPF from Angela Rayner. The vote taken on Thursday 19th September 2024 to pass the Local Plan Update, including the now slightly reduced 3,930 houses at Hall Farm was therefore taken at a bit of a rush, as Wokingham tried to get a Local Plan agreed before our targets went up by 74%, from 748 houses per year to 1,308 houses per year. But whose fault is it we left such an important part of our housing plan to the last minute? Not only that but those new targets must still be met, meaning the current plan is out of date before it is started.
We are now approaching the Regulation 19 stage of the Planning process, where an Independent Inspector judges if the Plan as submitted is "Sound". This report from Wokingham Conservatives puts a slightly different spin on the outcome of the vote to pass the Local Plan to the one presented here by Cllr Conway (LibDem Leader and Executive member for the Local Plan). It is now very clear that the Wokingham LibDems are being told to toe the party line and support the emerging Local Plan, whatever its' faults.
The social media post (shown left) from Chris Johnson (LibDem candidate for Shinfield in the upcoming by-election) supports the view that the LibDems in Wokingham now favour building 3,930 houses on green fields at Hall Farm.
It would be remiss of me to leave out the other candidates so I have tried to find out a bit more about where they stand in relation to the Local Plan in general and Hall Farm in particular. Labour is hoping to retain their seat in Shinfield with candidate Becca Brown. She is a local to Shinfield and her election statement is shown below.
The statement for the Green Party candidate Gary Nicholas Shacklady is not very informative (unless you care deeply about biscuits?) so I will let you read it for yourself, link here: https://www.whocanivotefor.co.uk/person/112118/gary-nicholas-shacklady
Meanwhile, anyone who lives in the vicinity of Hall Farm will know all about the chaos caused by the flooding mixed with unsustainable levels of traffic on our local roads. Shown below is a screen grab from Google Maps from a few days back. Gridlocked roads around Mill Lane.
If you WANT 3,930 houses at Hall Farm, with the attendant traffic CARnage vote LibDem in Shinfield on December 5th.
Roderick Paul Stevens
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