CAROLINE ANSELL MP: Biggest local NHS investment in a generation

What this means is we are set to have state-of-the-art health services on the existing DGH site in what is the biggest investment in our local NHS for a generation. The hospital is a beating heart in our community and this is a huge boost for patients, staff and the whole town.

It’s all part of the government’s plan to modernise the NHS and to level up the country. Quite a bit of this levelling up focus has been in the Midlands and the North but I have not let my Westminster colleagues forget the South East either as this huge investment of hundreds of millions of pounds demonstrates.

There is much work to do now for our local NHS trust, which has already been given money to develop and enable the plans. New planning permissions will need to be sought and given and further design decisions made.

All of this is work behind the scenes but I have already spoken with the Hospital Chief Exec and the Minister since last Friday’s announcement and things will move at pace. I will keep you updated on progress as the plans for the new hospital develop.

This week I formally responded to the government’s consultation on planning reform. Unlike many places in the South East, the proposed standard method algorithm will decrease the number of houses that need to be built in Eastbourne.

However, this is not the good news it appears. The decrease, using the algorithm, lowers the number from 600+ to 400+ per year when we currently struggle to build 200+.

What an algorithm doesn’t recognise is the fact that Eastbourne is really rather hemmed in by the sea and by the South Downs National Park and building space is at premium, likewise that Willingdon is at great risk of disproportionate development in the Wealden constituency. All points I have made to the consultation.

I certainly believe the planning system needs reform and I welcome the government’s ambition to make changes especially around green technology and promoting biodiversity.

However, I would very much like any reform to ensure developers build what is already agreed.

Between 2010 and 2017, 80 per cent of residential applications were granted across the country but nearly half remain unbuilt and this means there are currently up to one million permissions not yet completed. That translates to over 1,000 homes in Eastbourne.

It’s quite clear this backlog is unsustainable. We need to incentivise building out of existing sites and not reward a failure to build.

And in ‘building back’, I was pleased to visit local business Jarvis this last week, which specialises in the manufacture and development of bespoke textiles products. They have product lines which are in use across the world and with the capability of mobilising to manufacture PPE, they could be an answer to local resilience. I will be making it my business to get them connected and continue my work - to put Eastbourne on the map.