In her latest column, Tameside Council leader Councillor Brenda Warrington reflects on the recent full council meeting and discusses the plans to build Godley Green Garden Village in Hyde.
The eyes of Tameside were on Dukinfield Town Hall last week, as the first in person meeting of full council was held since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.
In a socially-distanced Jubilee Hall, we took the opportunity to pay tribute to one of Tameside’s most famous sons and freeman of the borough, Dr Ron Hill MBE, who tragically passed away recently at the age of 82.
I was also delighted to confirm that Councillors Janet Cooper and Mike Glover would be retaining their roles as Civic Mayor and Civic Deputy Mayor respectively for next year.
The meeting of full council also provided us with a chance to discuss the progress of the Godley Green Garden Village, and to make sure that the importance of the project for the borough is fully understood.
We are required by the government to have plans to build around 11,000 new homes over the next 17 years. Failure to come up with a realistic and deliverable plan to meet that target means that the developers will step in to do it for us.
We’ve seen enough of that in the past to know that this will lead to piecemeal, high-density and unsuitable building and the loss of even more of our precious greenspace.
The choice isn’t between building on Godley Green or not building on Godley Green. It is between building in a sustainable and organised way, or becoming the victim of a disastrous free-for-all of uncontrolled and uncontrollable development.
Our plan for Godley Green puts the people of Tameside, not the profits of developers, first.
We fully intend to look at and tweak the plans where appropriate, and we will also continue to take seriously any ideas, concerns and suggestions that are expressed to us.
But as I made clear at full council, we are going ahead with this project.
But the Godley Green Garden Village is just one strand of our ambitious plans for inclusive growth in Tameside.
By driving investment in jobs and housing, regenerating our town centres and protecting our shared environment, we intend to transform the quality of life of our residents and create, as I’ve said before, a local economy that serves the people and not the other way round.
As we begin to heal from the coronavirus pandemic, I pledge that Tameside Council will leave no stone unturned to make that bright new future a reality.
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