5:00am Monday 6th July 2009
By Jon Austin
BASILDON Council would need to build at least five new traveller sites to meet proposed caravan pitch numbers by 2011.
Regional targets for the East of England, expected to be finalised this year, say the district needs 62 new caravan plots to accommodate travellers living on illegal pitches.
A response to the Department for Communities and Local Government’s latest consultation says sites would have to be built on green belt because of lack of other land.
It states: “The allocation of 62 pitches would result in a minimum of five sites having to be identified in the district.”
The council already has 116 legal pitches while some neighbours such as Southend, which is being asked to create 15, has none.
Basildon still hopes to challenge the levels.
The response added: “The council maintains its challenge to the methodology of distribution and considers the suggested figure is still very high.
“The prospect of identifying such a high number of sites across a very small district is such that the deliverability of the target is severely in doubt.”
However, the response accepts the council will have to provide new pitches to cater for growth in existing authorised plots at the rate of a 3 per cent annual increase.
Grattan Puxon, a campaigner for the travellers, said: “We hope the council sees sense and accepts it must provide the 62 pitches when the common sense solution would be to allow people at Dale Farm to remain where they are to meet this quota.”
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