Newport Gypsy plan is unsound, claim campaign group - Gwent

From the South Wales Argus

A TEAM of consultants commissioned by an anti-Gipsy site group have alleged that a plan for how the city will grow over the next few years is unsound.

Newport’s local development plan process has been fraught with controversy because of the proposals for residential and transit sites for Gypsys and Travellers that have been included.

Musker Sumner Partnership, commissioned by the Ringland Matters group, said there were a number of shortfalls with the local development plan.

The Ringland Matters group is opposed to proposals for a large Gypsy and Traveller site, including in the draft local development plan, for Hartridge Farm Road.

Newport council went out to consultant on a revised local development plan that included revised proposals for the Gypsy and Traveller sites earlier this year.

The consultant’s report, which was submitted to the council as part of that consultation, said that the “most obvious conflict” with national policy was over the size of the permanent residential site proposed at Hartridge Farm Road.

It said that national guidance on site design sets out they should be no more than 12 pitches in size – but 43 are proposed at the site, according to the report.

It also alleges that the process was not transparent enough to assess how extensive or appropriate consultation with Gypsy and Traveller communities had been.

It claimed that the revised local development plan was not helped by the “apparent dismissal in the site selection criterion of existing or unauthorised encampments or any site outside the urban boundary”.

“That is not what government guidance on this issue sets out,” the report reads.

“We can see no evidence in the revised LDP of any cross boundary liaison or any assessment as to how the policy put forward fits in with adjacent strategies or the regional picture of the provision for residential, and in particular, transit sites.”

A Newport council spokeswoman said: “All responses received as part of the consultation are being considered and the final version of the LDP will be presented to full council on December 19 for approval.

“At that stage, the report to members will include the details of all the responses including those from the Ringland Matters group and the officers’ comments in relation to them.”