Department for Communities and Local Government – Jac o' the North

Bodelwyddan and the Bigger Picture

Jac — Thu, 13 Mar 2014 21:59:43 +0000

I had intended putting this out on Twitter or Facebook, just to inform people that the deadline for representations on the planned 1,700 new homes at Bodelwyddan in Denbighshire has been extended to March 21st. In view of the new figures available for both population predictions and household size it is well worth challenged this …

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Housing In Wales – Back To The Drawing Board!

Jac — Mon, 03 Mar 2014 19:58:04 +0000

In a number of recent posts – work back from here – I have criticised the projections made by the Knowledge and Analytical Services (KAS), a unit based in Cardiff but answering to the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) in London. These projections have raised questions as to their reliability and true purpose, especially …

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Housing in Wales: Time for Honesty

Jac — Sun, 19 Jan 2014 23:37:51 +0000

As regular readers will be aware, I have recently focused on planning and housing in Wales, more specifically, the data being used to forecast how many new homes Wales will ‘need’ over the next couple of decades. What I have learnt is that the forecasts produced in the name of the ‘Welsh’ Government bear little …

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Housing (Wales) Bill, My Response

Jac — Tue, 14 Jan 2014 12:49:51 +0000

Following on from the previous post, here is my response to the Welsh Government’s Department for Communities and Local Government’s Housing (Wales) Bill. The deadline for responses is Friday, so if you want to make a point then do it now, and send it to CELGCommittee@wales.gov.uk. In case the PDF version below should disappear (as …

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Lebensraum and the Rented Sector

Jac — Thu, 09 Jan 2014 16:27:33 +0000

In my recent posts I have dealt with the projected increase in households Wales will see in the next few decades. Predictions made by civil servants answering to the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) in London, and who are provided with a fig leaf of ‘Welsh’ credibility by Carl Sargeant, Minister for Housing …

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Lies, Damned Lies, and English Civil Servants

Jac — Mon, 06 Jan 2014 19:19:27 +0000

To recap . . . I believe I have established in recent posts that the ‘new households’ projections used by the Planning Inspectorate to force through the recent Local Development Plans are flawed. Deeply flawed. So obviously flawed that they were almost certainly contrived to serve a darker purpose than the provision of new housing. …

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Richard Poppleton, ‘Organ Grinder’

Jac — Mon, 30 Dec 2013 22:34:14 +0000

This post is a kind of New Year’s Resolution. Specifically, a promise to waste less time in 2014 on the ‘monkeys’ down Cardiff docks and to pay more attention to the ‘organ grinders’. For it is becoming increasingly clear that simia politicus cambrensis is encouraged to chatter and dance in order that he – and, …

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