Lewes Green Party councillors call for 'outbreak of truth' from Sussex MP

The reaction follows comments made by Maria Caulfield in her latest newsletter, in which the Lewes MP claimed local green spaces were being targeted by developers because when district councillors refuse the applications, they are merely overturned by the planning inspector.

Ms Caulfield called on the district council leaders to ‘take responsibility for this mess’ and provide an up-to-date Local Plan to guide decisions on future development proposals.

The Conservative MP wrote: “Lewes District until recently, had a Local Plan that was in date. But since the Lib Dems and Greens took over, the Local Plan was let go out of date, and so we are now seeing sites for applications in places such as Wivelsfield, Plumpton and Chailey that were previously protected.

"My plea to the Lib Dems and Greens who run the local council is to get the plan back in date to protect these sites as the planning inspector has made clear this is the reason, they are overturning refusals.

"Councillors Zoe Nicholson and James MacCleary as leaders of the council, need to take responsibility for this mess. We cannot take more housing in towns like Newhaven and Seaford without the infrastructure to support it and we cannot keep building on our green spaces in places like Ringmer and Newick.”

Green Party councillors have said Ms Caulfield’s recent claim is just the latest of a number of communications which they argue are becoming increasingly toxic.

Green councillor and Parliamentary candidate Emily O’Brien said: “Few issues concern local residents more than the influx of major development targeting precious greenfield sites. But local residents do not want to see their MP playing the blame game, they want to see us all working together to address the problems.

“As Maria Caulfield knows, at the heart of this is a fractured planning system which has lost the trust of residents. And as councillors we can’t fix this alone - we need the support of our MP.

"The District Council is being hammered by the unfair housing target system, and hammered by the ‘5-year review’ rule; which means that that our widely respected Local Plan, adopted in 2016 and intended to guide development until 2036, is being overruled by developers and government planning inspectors regardless of local wishes.”

In October, Ms Caulfield angered Lewes District councillors when she called the Local Plan ‘out of date’ when speaking to the House of Commons Committee.

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Green and Lib Dem councillors believe the council's current local plan is out-of-date because of the government’s rule changes and not because of the inaction of the local authority.

Zoe Nicholson, deputy leader of Lewes District Council and a Green Councillor, said: “I’ve been dealing with the consequences of Ms Caulfield’s latest email to residents and its misinformation.

"Her email preys on people’s fears instead of helping them understand the facts. At a time when people should feel like they can trust their political representatives, all they get is confusing messages, not knowing who to trust.

"We need to stop playing politics with this critical issue and focus on changing our broken planning system.”