Promoted by Paul Harvey on behalf of the Independent Forum at 40 Ruskin Close RG213QH
What do we stand for
Serving The Community
Our guiding principles are focused on rebuilding trust, renewing our democracy, restoring your faith in what your Council can do for our Borough. We believe in the common good; that Basingstoke & Deane Council has a responsibility to be better; to meet the needs, ambitions and aspirations of the people of our borough. We believe that by the strength of our shared common values with cooperation and localism we can unleash the potential of our borough.
United By A Common Goal
We are building something very special. We are a collective of like-minded councillors who are not bound by party politics. We are totally focused on our residents and what we can do together: working for our borough. We have started to deliver as a new Council administration. Councillors working with all groups - working together for our Borough:
Delivering results
We have achieved a lot in just a year, since taking over running the Council in May 2023.
We are working with other councillors from all groups. We have identified priorities that we hope meet the ambitions and aspirations of local people across our Borough.
Our policies
Development in our Borough
We are holding developers accountable and putting our communities first; protecting our towns and villages from overdevelopment. We produced a draft Local Plan in 2024 that reduced the housing number by 20% in the first five years of the new draft Local Plan - down to 693 homes a year. The new Government then changed the rules and increased the Borough's housing number to 1157. We do not support this increase and are deeply concerned about it's impact on our communities and the environment. We proposed adopting much stronger policies to control development as a part of our draft Local Plan. We want Government to empower councils so we can ensure infrastructure comes first. We want high environmental standards and we know now from evidence we have commissioned that South East Water cannot meet the uplift in housing numbers the government is demanding. We want to reduce housing to a scale we can cope with, which delivers the much needed socially rented affordable housing we all know we need, but which also protects our communities from overdevelopment. We are delivering Manydown North and in doing so protect our villages securing the strategic gaps.
Leisure Park & Sports
We’ve announced a new Aquadrome, which will include soft play, clip and climb wall, gym and spa. We have kept ice in Basingstoke with the refurbishment of the Ice Rink. We are also looking at proposals for a Skate Park and BMX facility. We are working on bringing new leisure facilities to Basingstoke. We’ve delivered new cricket and hockey pitches. We’ve renewed the tennis centre. We are talking positively with Basingstoke Town Community Football Club about their future. We want to revitalise our leisure and sports offer. We've agreed heads of terms with Great Wolf Resorts.
Housing & Regeneration
New homes in our Borough should be built to the highest standards. We want socially rented homes that people can afford and homes that meet our local needs. We are working to address the housing issues many of our communities in Basingstoke & Deane are facing. Delivering Manydown North will unlock upto 1,400 new affordable homes. It is critical that residents voices are heard and respected. We are clear that partnership must mean working with everyone, collectively for the whole community.
Town Centre
We are renewing the retail and leisure offer in Basingstoke town centre. We are working successfully with Festival Place to bring in new shops and leisure uses. We’ve kept the AA in Basingstoke, retaining our major employers is a priority. We are looking at a new economic plan to promote inward investment into the Borough. We want a university to open a new campus in Basingstoke. We are working to renew the Top of Town, we started with a deep clean and a major grants scheme for businesses in our high streets across the Borough, which has been hugeky successful.
Play areas and green spaces
We will protect the green spaces we have and insist on the highest possible green space standards on new developments. We will accelerate investment in renewal of our play areas. We have already invested £250,000 and accelerated a programme of play area renewal. We are committed to our allotments and are investing £300,000 in them.
Our Villages and Towns
We oppose speculative development in our towns and villages. We want local people to be able to set the future, not top down diktat from Central Government. We removed car parking charges from Whitchurch, Overton and Kingsclere. We're investing in supporting our Parish Councils as partners. We support neighbourhood planning and allocated a budget of £100,000 to help parish councils develop their plans.
Biodiversity & Tackling Climate Change
We have developed a new Biodiversity Strategy that will protect and enhance our natural world. We want to protect and enhance our rivers and environment, re-naturalising to help tackle climate change. We will challenge the water companies for dumping raw sewage in our rivers. We are fitting solar panels on council owned buildings in our business parks and on our community centres. We are rolling out new EV charging locations. We've invested directly in greener cleaner EV taxi’s. We’ve made all our waste collection lorries run on green fuel - saving 98% on emissions. We've introduced a weekly food waste collection service and reduced waste increasing recycling following the mandatory targets.
Invigorating our Democracy
We want to reinvigorate local democracy through greater transparency and community engagement. We visited over 30 parish and town councils this year, talking about the future of the Borough. We are talking to people hearing the issues you care about, and getting on with the job of delivering.