Last month, we were informed that the statutory challenge to the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead’s Borough Local Plan (BLP), which the Maidenhead Great Park Community Interest Group has funded and promoted, had been refused by the Judge on the grounds that a document was not ‘served’ on time by our solicitor.
We were incredibly disappointed to learn, that despite the profoundly negative long-term consequences of this environmentally damaging BLP for our community, the Judge decided that due to the clerical error the case cannot proceed.
On the advice of our legal team, we submitted a request for a renewal hearing to the High Court. It has now been confirmed that we do have the right to a renewal hearing, which will allow our arguments to be re-examined in open court. There we aim to demonstrate that the full merits of our case must be heard in a statutory review hearing.
We cannot know at this stage when the renewal hearing will take place, or whether it will be successful, but we will continue to explore every avenue open to us to get the merits of this BLP legal challenge heard.
We would like to thank everyone who has supported this ongoing legal challenge.
Over 500 people have so far donated towards our work to protect greenspace and woodlands in our community. The number of people supporting our campaign is an important factor in helping to demonstrate the public interest in this case, and that the clerical error, through no fault of our own, should not prevent our community from engaging in their statutory right for the BLP to be further scrutinised.
The record high temperatures experienced last week, as well as the wild fires in London, France, Spain, the US and elsewhere across the planet, are evidence that we simply must take action right now to save our remaining trees and woodlands, which provide shade and cool our air through transpiration, as well as absorbing pollution and supporting biodiversity.
We must take steps right now to green our communities, to help mitigate the effects of climate change.
The destruction of hundreds of acres of green belt and thousands of mature trees, as set out in RBWM’s Borough Local Plan, to make way for housing targets that are based on out-of-date projections for housing need in our area, is simply unacceptable and will damage our community for many decades to come.
We will continue to campaign for the protection of greenspace in our community, for the benefit of both people and wildlife.
To find out more about our campaign, go to www.maidenheadgreatpark.co.uk
Background
The Maidenhead Great Park group formed in 2020 to campaign against the development of the 132 acres of woodlands and greenspace owned by the people of Maidenhead and leased by Maidenhead Golf Club, which is home to over 10,000 mature trees and dozens of protected species. The adoption of the Borough Local Plan on 8 February 2022, took this land out of the green belt, allowing RBWM to push forward with its plans to develop this publicly owned area of open space with over 2,000 new flats and houses.
On 22 March 2022, following a successful public fundraising campaign for the initial legal fees needed, the Maidenhead Great Park Community Interest Company promoted and funded filing for a statutory challenge of RBWM’s Borough Local Plan.
Unfortunately, our solicitors made a technical error in the serving of the papers and resigned from the case. Working with new solicitors, we applied to the court for an extension to the timeframe for service and it was up to the Judge’s discretion to accept the case.
RBWM is fully aware that this action is taken and funded by hundreds of local residents, who do not feel that the BLP process was followed correctly or that their voices were heard. However, RBWM has continued to capitalise on this technical error to thwart the attempts by this group to exercise our right for a statutory review of the BLP.
Ways to support our campaign
- Sign our petition asking our council to improve its measurement of health damaging air pollution https://rbwm.moderngov.co.uk/mgEPetitionDisplay.aspx?ID=2163&RPID=8212844&HPID=8212844
- Contribute towards our campaign here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/maidenhead-great-park