IF DAVID Rose had hopes of a quiet life as he saw out his days as a local government officer with Birmingham City Council, they were soon dashed shortly after moving into Crumpfields Lane, Webheath.
“We were looking for somewhere to make our last house move and we thought Webheath was ideal – the people are great, incredibly friendly and we bordered beautiful countryside, which, I suppose, is what makes it so attractive to developers,” said the 61-year-old chairman of Webheath Action Group (WAG).
“Within six months of coming here, I saw something about Webheath being discussed for housing.
“Back then (2001) there was something called the South West Action Group (SWAG) which was fighting developers’ plans to build 2,000 homes across the area, and I started to get involved by making people aware of what was going on.”
SWAG succeeded in their battle – with just a few concessions – but the attraction of developing the Webheath area never went away and what followed has absorbed much of David’s life.
“My wife Sue would say it’s taken over my life, but I’ve always tried to work around home life by doing most of the work at night, to try and fit in,” he said.
Planning authorities have to produce a Local Plan detailing how they see their area developing, which requires the authority to earmark land for at least a five year housing supply.
In 2006 Redditch produced its Local Plan 3 which included proposals to site 600 homes in Webheath.
“I wrote to every house in Crumpfields Lane, Church Road and Pumphouse Lane. Within six months we had had a meeting and formed a committee to fight the plan,” said David, a father of two.
He spoke at the public inquiry, managed to have the plans stalled and asked for the land to be declared Green Belt, which the planning inspector rejected.
This was followed in 2007 by Local Plan 4, which, said David, saw proposals mooted to rank development sites in order of priority putting Bordesley first, Brockhill second, Foxlydiate third and Webheath fourth.
However, he believes that plans to build at Bordesley, in Bromsgrove district, were quashed because it would encroach on Alvechurch and Rowney Green.
“The developers then started working with the council and it upset us greatly when the council adopted documents prepared by the developers and changed their position on building at Webheath,” said David.
Whilst accepting they would have to take some degree of development, WAG have argued throughout that their area is too far from the town centre and employment centres and would require huge amounts of infrastructure to make any major development sustainable.
Bordesley and Brockhill, they said, would be easier to develop and closer to both facilities and jobs and throughout they’ve been backed by both Labour County Councillor Robin Lunn and Conservative MP Karen Lumley.
“We’ve had no political bias throughout the campaign; Karen Lumley has been tremendously supportive as has Robin Lunn who has spoken passionately for us at every hearing,” said David.
Their campaign reached its current climax at the end of March at another hearing before planning inspector Michael Hetherington with a verdict which could come as soon as April 15.
“It’s important to recognise that I’m not a one-man band – we have nine hard working committee members and we’ve produced three petitions, each with more than 1,000 signatures,” said David. “I want to thank our sponsors, donors and the support of Webheath residents. WAG could not have achieved what it has done without them.”
For more information, visit www.savethewebheathadr.co.uk
