Labour Party to demand more affordable homes now District Plan adopted

It has also commented on the 500 homes which are to be built in Hassocks, despite ‘clear objections’.

A spokesman for the party said: “Over the last six months the people of Hassocks have come together to express their anger at the Tory proposals in the District Plan to allocate land north of Hassocks, to build 500 homes.

“The parish council made their objections clear, Hassocks resident Peter Rayner organised a Save Hassocks campaign, and the local Labour Party along with other opposition groups campaigned to raise their concerns.

“However there was one organisation that ignored the interests of Hassocks residents – the local Conservative Party.

“It is unsurprising that Tories from other parts of Mid Sussex leapt at the chance to dig themselves out of the hole they had got into without a District Plan by dumping an ill-thought-out development onto Hassocks.

“But what the Labour Party finds staggering is that Hassocks Conservative councillors chose to put party before community by voting in favour of the modified District Plan.”

John Kelly, secretaty of Hassocks and Hurst Labour, said Labour councillors would have ‘stood by the people of Hassocks’.

“Now that this District Plan has been approved Labour will press the council to demand that developers allocate more homes for local residents including much needed genuinely low cost affordable homes to buy and to rent,” he said.

“We need new homes priced at what local people can afford not what makes developers most money.”

Hassocks Labour branch chair, Will Matthews, added: “Trust in this Tory council administration is already in short supply, and with this latest decision many Hassocks residents will not put their faith in Tory councillors again when the next local elections come in 2019.”