Campaign group Build a Better Bembridge (BBB) is calling on the Isle of Wight Council to build more affordable homes on sustainable sites.
The group — originally set up to address residents’ concerns over inappropriate housebuilding in Bembridge — says it wants a wider conversation about delivering appropriate homes that meet genuine Island-wide need.
It cites a current planning application, on Steyne Road, for 11 two-bedroom flats on brownfield land as an example.
BBB has criticised the excessive allocation of greenfield land in the current draft Island Planning Strategy.
Sara Smith of Build a Better Bembridge said:
“We agree there is a housing need on the Island for low-cost homes including affordable rental accommodation.
"Developing large chunks of farmland on the edge of villages will swell the bank balances of private developers but it will do little to deliver homes that most Islanders can actually afford.
"Only a minority of homes on private land can be designated as “affordable” and even then, affordable only means 80 per cent of market price."
Local Councillor, Joe Robertson, added:
“Bembridge is already set to deliver more than 40 homes by way of approved permissions and future windfall sites.
"The village has had a longstanding record of delivering housing development and it is not turning its back on delivering for local people in the future.
"But when the local bank has closed, the local garage has been knocked down and replaced with housing, and the Council are trying to reduce pupil places at Bembridge Primary School we have to take a stand and say enough is enough.
"We cannot accommodate another 180 additional properties.”
Captiva Homes has recently announced what it says are a range of environment pledges which include carbon offset against the homes it builds by planting trees and rewilding on land it says it has secured.
But BBB remains sceptical. with Gerry Price of BBB responding:
“Planting trees and rewilding at some unspecified location at an unspecified future date does nothing for the individual villages which developers are pouring concrete into.
"How does planting trees in another part of the Island deal with the already overstretched Victorian sewage systems or the major flooding we saw in Bembridge and Binstead last summer and in Arreton this summer?"
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