MP guest blog: New houses need new GP practices

Liberal Democrat MP for Horsham John Milne on how the restrictions local planning authorities face have caused a deficit of GP surgeries and other public infrastructure

In my constituency of Horsham, there’s one complaint I hear very loudly and very often: How can we keep building thousands more houses every year without the schools, clinics and transport to support them? Why should anyone believe things will get better when past promises have been broken so often? When will the artists’ impressions of new developments turn into reality?

The answer to these questions is simple. My local council, Horsham District Council, does not have the power to tie development to the provision of health and education facilities. And it’s the same for every other local planning authority.

Like much of the South East, Horsham is struggling with grossly overloaded facilities. Some GP surgeries are operating at 4x the number of patients they were designed for. On top of this, patients are visiting the clinic much more frequently than they used to. The whole day’s appointments are filled within minutes of the lines opening in the morning. This places unfair stress on relatively low paid reception staff, who must spend the rest of their day saying ‘no’.

Accusations of bad faith are usually directed at the developers and the local council. But the truth is, in most cases, neither are the real culprits. The ultimate decision to build or not build vital new services, such as clinics and schools, lies with the Government – not the local authority. In most cases, the developer and the local authority lay out their plans in good faith. They will liaise with the Integrated Care Boards and the Department for Education to understand local needs. With their agreement, any new services will be designed into the plan.

Unfortunately, all too often, the ICB and DofE change their minds. Every government department is under constant pressure to save money.  A few years down the line, they will decide that it would be cheaper to squeeze new residents into clinics we already have and their children into existing schools. Even if the developer has agreed to pay for the building of a new clinic, the ICB may still decide not to go ahead. But this happens after planning consent has already been granted.

From day one, the new Labour Government has made it clear that solving our national housing shortage is a priority. To this end, they have turbo-charged housebuilding targets that were already at high levels under the previous government.

The problem is that they’ve done nothing to strengthen local authority control over services. The Government has focused all its attention on removing barriers to planning permissions. But unless they also act to close the infrastructure deficit, there is no possibility of public consent.

I suspect that, like my colleagues across the South East, I will continue to hear these same angry questions from residents…

John Milne is the Liberal Democrat MP for Horsham