Southend High Street protest over green belt housebuilding

Branding themselves “Green Belters”, the demonstrators represented a number of residents’ associations and campaign groups from Southend, Basildon, Castle Point and Rochford.

The protestors gathered on Southend High Street and called for an end to the encroachment of new housing developments into rural areas across the region.

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Passion - Residents gathered on Southend High Street (Image: James Miller)

The demonstration was the third of its kind to take place in Southend, and saw speakers raise concerns around the pressure that new developments could place on existing infrastructure and the potential loss of green belt land.

James Miller, Leader of the Confelicity Party and candidate for the Greater Essex Mayoral Election, was one of those to speak at the event.

Protest - Campaigners for Billericay's green belt alongside Phillip and James Miller (Image: James Miller)

"For the first time, we brought all the green belt campaigns across south Essex together, spanning Wakering all the way through to Basildon,” he said.

"We believe new housing must be in brownfield sites and sold for prices that local people can actually afford.  

"We also believe that our infrastructure and public services are struggling as they are, and the very last thing we need is another 100,000 houses swelling the population to unmanageable levels." 

Greens - L-R; Simon Gittus (Green Party Candidate for West Leigh), Cllr Richard Longstaff, Tricia Cowdrey, Graham Main, and Kay Mitchell (Image: Simon Gittus)

According to the campaigners, changes to national planning guidelines and housebuilding targets are posing a threat to the character, ecology and sense of place of sites outlined in councils' local plans and proposed by developers.

These proposals include plans for 2,000 homes off Bournes Green Chase in Southend, 1,100 homes on Billericay’s Southend Road and 350 homes on green belt land off Mount Bovers Lane in Hawkwell.

Campaigners - L-R; Julie Gooding, Tricia Cowdrey and Martin England lead various south Essex residents' groups (Image: Julie Gooding)

Julie Gooding, non-aligned councillor for Hawkwell West and member of the Save Mount Bovers campaign group, said: "Communities like ours are being left to fight for the very air we breathe and the nature that sustains us.

"Our communities deserve better, and we will keep fighting until we are heard.”

Prior to Saturday’s demonstration, a spokesperson for Southend Council said it welcomed people sharing their views peacefully and was keen to work with communities to find “the right balance” when it came to new housing developments.