Commons Select Committee to carry out an inquiry into Park Home Sites

There have been a number of issues nationally with the running of Park Home sites and The House of Commons Select Committee, apparently fed up with the governments promised reforms failing to appear, has ordered an inquiry into their operation and the adequacy of the law.  Items to be looked at may include

• site fees & services (e.g. cost of gas)
• the awarding and revocation of site licences
• the regulation and enforcement of site license conditions
• the need for the manager of a site to be a “fit and proper” person and the enforcement of this requirement
• the regulation of parks owned by local authorities
• the protection of occupiers of park homes against harassment and illegal eviction
• the resale of park homes and resale fees.

The committee wants to hear submissions from interested parties, particularly those who live in park homes, site owners and local authorities with park homes within their areas .  More detail can be seen on the Parliamentary website here.

Submissions needs to be by email and no more than 4,000 words long, If you wish to make a submission please lets us know as we are happy to assist. We ourselves will also be making a submission to the Select Committee and hope to be called to make an oral report.

For those who may not be aware’ Hullbridge has 6 of the 8 mobile home parks registered in the District numbering approximately 500 homes out of a total of around 2,750 in the village.  This is an important matter for a large number of residents and will allow them to at last put their points of view across.

600 Houses for Hall Farm Road?

Rochford District Council is to discuss the second major planning application put in after the passing of the Core Strategy in December.

This application, for 600 houses on green belt land along Hall Farm Road in Rochford, comes just a month after another application for 176 houses in Hawkwell (which was refused).

The schedule for the application is on the council website and can be read here but this application is so large a page on the council website has been set up for it and can be read here.

It is hard to summarise such an application but points to be noted should include

• It is an outline plan not a detailed one.
• The Core Strategy does require houses to be built in West Rochford, although specific sites have not yet been officially chosen
• A large number of people don’t like it, with 164 letters objecting and just 4 in favour.

It is certain to be a busy night at the Civic Suite as this is by far the biggest application in relation to the Core Strategy so far.

Closure of Public Toilets

At the District Councils Executive meeting in November it was decided, after much public pressure, to postpone any decisions on closing the public toilets within the District until January.  The January meeting is planned for the 11th of this month and the Agenda can be seen here.

As can be seen from the Agenda the toilets are to be discussed under item 12, The Future Provision of Public Conveniences.  However the most interesting thing to note about this is the exclusion of the Press and Public at item 11 meaning the decision will not be reported and Councillors will not be able to talk about the outcome.

This would seem to be an abuse of the system, if the first proposal could be discussed in public why not the second?  Is it down to an executive running scared of the opposition?