This is how our housing figures are really calculated

THREE weeks ago the leader in the Herald talked about the SHMA (Strategic Housing Market Assessment) frustration. This is the basis of the "Objectively Assessed Need" for housing in Oxfordshire and the figure that forms the basis of all local plans.

The figure is calculated using a secret formula to forecast what the growth in jobs will be in Oxfordshire over 20 years from 2011. Then using that, the forecast population growth, and projected inward migration to Oxfordshire, a figure is then dreamt up for the number of houses they say that we need.

It doesn’t consider how these houses will be fitted into the county without affecting Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty or Oxford Green Belt. It doesn’t take any account of whether the roads, health services, schools, public transport and leisure facilities will be sufficient. It doesn’t consider whether the people they expect to want the houses will be able to afford them. It also takes no account of the possible environmental impacts on new and existing residents.

These basic things are the responsibilities of our councils who have blithely accepted the Objectively Assessed Need as the basis of their Local Plans and assume the developers will pay for infrastructure.

Anyway, the reason why the SHMA came to my mind this week is because Oxfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership (OxLEP) have published the next draft of their refreshed Strategic Economic Plan (SEP) for consideration by the district councils.

This is, of course, based on the growth forecasts in the SHMA. The SEP acknowledges the far greater global economic uncertainty that is likely to define the next five years, including the impact of Brexit and possible devolution, but doesn’t change its plans.

It also acknowledges that the original SEP was essentially a bidding document to get a share of government money. What it doesn’t say, is that we have received less funding than 23 of the 39 Local Enterprise Partnerships around the country.

Hidden in the middle of the document is a proposal for the "development of a Land and Property Partnership Board to support the use, deployment and regeneration of public land and other major landholdings". So if I understand this correctly, we will spend even more money on another unelected body to decide how public land will be utilised.

You may have seen the recent article from the Heritage Lottery Fund which states that more than half of local authorities are set to sell off their parks or transfer them to other ownership – is this what OxLEP and our Councils have in mind?

Or are they just planning to turn all public land (including parks) into housing estates?