Cheshire East refuses 325-home project after 3.5-hour debate

The politicians on this Council are a joke. Hopefully Bloor will go for costs and they are successful at an Appeal getting them awarded.

Once again the councillors of Cheshire East Council demonstrate the ability to make rational decisions, support local people looking for affordable housing, follow the professional advice around planning rules and fly the flag for being narrow minded and self serving

One for Steve Reed at over 150 homes…. perhaps thats what they ( local councillors) want to happen so they can face their nimby consituents and blame someone else for it.

Get it appealed!

Ludicrous decision yet again by Councillors, a further waste of public money taking this to appeal. Cheshire East Officers must be tearing their hair out.

Another classic example of the broken planning system in the UK. Part time amateurs blocking schemes recommended by the professional services. Take planning away from them and have independent people from the built environment making decisions .

What a waste of tax payers money which is already stretched to the limits for such a bazaar decision. Why wasn’t this worked out with Bloor at an early stage if it was a real issue.

I’m guessing as the next electoral cycle gets closer we are going to see more of these performative declines. Although we all mocked Stockport they’ve at least they’ve now decided to grab the issue. This is really poor local leadership.

At least 950 of the objections want shredding as it has nothing to do with them barring a ride on the NIMBY bus… this land affects maybe 50 properties and even then, so what… such is life. Moaning about doctors, schools etc. has all but nothing to do with the housebuilder, it’s the councils problem. Its a field that a 1000 locals wouldn’t be able to find yet they’ll all grab a pen or rattle on a keyboard for a cry when progress knocks on the door. Hopefully Bloor an find a grown up to fix the issue…

Tremendous outcome, if only because the planning committee had the courage of their convictions. Better to lose on appeal than agree for the wrong reasons.

It’s high time that local councillors were relieved of their responsibilities when it comes to planning. They are by and large self-serving and narrow minded – we need YIMBYism and growth, the old order isn’t working and needs to be forced out of the way

Put the committee in special measures!

Crazy decision.

OMG it’s 2010+ all over again. Someone needs to FOI the Council to see how much all those successful appeals of the time cost the taxpayers of CEC in terms of costs for defending the cases and the costs claimed by appellants and awarded by Inspectors for the Councils unreasonable behaviour. That’s not to mention all the litigation CEC entered into to try and overturn successful planning appeals and generally failed. Now is not the time for Nimbyism it’s time to dig deep and get this country out of the housing mess it’s in!

Great outcome! Up the NIMBYs.
This isn’t a housing crisis — it’s an affordability crisis. We need real social housing, not developer “affordable” projects covering the countryside. People are more than ready for this YIMBY government to be shown the door.

People have to have somewhere to live but before any new builds occur the infrastructure has to be addressed first hospitals schools and roads Sandbach gets grid locked especially when the M6 is shut for whatever reason so untill facilities are planned rejecting these plans was the right decision

There are destroying the country’s and wild life no more biulding

This and Wainhomes proposal will be passed, London will get this sorted and soon hopefully… What’s funny about this is that they’ll get passed and built and the local council will have a hefty legal bill to pay.. Guess who that will affect? Good job keyboard warriors and well done to Mable running around the Sandbach with a clipboard in one hand a placard in the other… I hope you like your bins being emptied every four weeks… lol

@SImon Hassell Basic economic theory is price is a set by supply and demand. If you want affordability to come down, you need to increase supply.

As for a great result, Cheshire East lost about £1m in costs awarded against them last time they decided that national planning policies didn’t apply to them. A s114 Council going further into the red isn’t positive for anyone anywhere and just delays the inevitable

What a waste of taxpayer money this will be when the appeal gets passed and costs are awarded.

There is far too much building going on in Cheshire, destroying green belt land and putting more vehicles on the local roads which are already overused! Who are all these homes for, just people who fancy living out in country areas? If many more come it will no longer be a country area. Cheshire used to be a beautiful county which is changing rapidly into a built up area. The Government and many other organisations talk about saving the environment and our planet but still let building of thousands of properties, many 3, 4 and even 5 bedroomed! It’s utterly disgusting.

More bungalows less big houses should spare monies re pairing road structers

Good – more pointless sprawl in areas with no mass of job vacancies is just stupid.

WiII Cheshire East never Iearn?? Yet another Iost appeaI at the Tax Payer’s expense as a resuIt of seIf-serving NIMBYISM at it’s worst. What is the point in paying professionaI pIanning Officers if their recommendations are going to be ignored by the Butcher, Baker and CandIestick maker – time this nonsense was stopped??

Another NIMBY community wins whilst we never get the housing supply built needed….

The issue here is that the Bloor Scheme should have been challenged at the very beginning. Low Cost Housing Association or joint Council and consumer owned housing yes, but affordable housing is too vague a term.
There is also the issue of whether this is prime farm land, because we are losing too much of that, but if the correct mix if house types and on Class 2 land, notnclass 1, then this should have gained consent.

People in Cheshire will moan about a lack of investment and then when they get investment they’re hostile towards it. If Cheshire East doesn’t want any economic growth or employment then I’m sure Manchester and other, more progressive places will have it instead.

Just don’t expect any handouts from said places.

To those cheering the result, maybe best to keep this in mind when CEC next increase Council Tax again, and continue to cut services….

@Steve 10:01 What exactly is meant by “affordable”? Do we really believe developers will flood the market with homes they have to sell at a loss? Of course not. Their business model isn’t built around delivering genuinely affordable housing.

If we want true affordability, we need investment in social homes—and in the right locations. There isn’t a shortage of 4–5 bedroom executive houses; the real demand is for social housing.

The government keeps calling this a “housing crisis,” but the reality is quite different—and people are finally starting to see it.

Where is the infrastructure coming from???

The people who live there should make a local neighbourhood plan. This gives locals more power over planning applications. It’s just not that well known about

Thank God for that

Good it’s about time Councils listened to those who pay their wages and have there own views and have to live with whatever is said in chamber

It’s too easy for the developers to use green belt for example why are they not showing interest in the old central school on Byron Street it’s a great building for lots of people and lots of car parking

Great News

Good on ’em!
Wish the Council had the same guts to refuse more building of houses in Congleton!
We have hundreds of houses being built in and around the town, without any space allocated for additional Doctors, Dentists and Schools! This is ludicrous as it is already almost impossible to get a doctor or dentist appointment!

About time that the Planning Department at Cheshire East was given a bloody nose. They’ve tried to build hundreds of houses without any regard to infrastructure issues, I.e. Doctors, Schools, Roads, Sewers etc. The town is coming to a grinding halt and, it seems, the Planners are only interested in Rates Income which, ultimately, feathers their own salary and pension “nests”. Good on the committee for saying NO!!

Planning will be approved on appeal with the council having to pay the developers costs. The councillors have made a bad decision for short-term political gain, they should hold their heads in shame.

Developers see Cheshire’s farmlands and salivate.. they don’t care about it’s history or future… It’s simply pounds to them with their nonsense “affordable housing” it’s only affordable because the tax payer including future council tax payers are being made to pay for it… If they can’t be bought on the free market… They are not needed.

The article is very partial – it implies that the reason for refusing the application was driven by the desire to protect two listed buildings and the Leonard Cheshire Home. Anyone who knows the invaluable work that is carried out in the relative transquillity of the Leonard Cheshire Home will deplore the idea to turn the land around it into a building site and thence into a crowded housing development. There are other serious consideration of drainage and land contamination. The Government may have imposed a housebuilding quota but that does not means that most of that quota has to be built on Sandbach. The roads around the town are painfully vulnerable to all the problems on the M6, and when it gets very crowded the small central roads are gridlocked.