Agenda item

Asking a questionand addressing the Board

Questions (in full and in writing) or requests to make an address (in full and in writing) must be received by 5pm on Wednesday 18 November 2020 three clear working days before the Growth Board meeting subject to the following exception in relation to Item 11 only.

The deadline in respect of Item 11: Investment in improved rail connectivity in Oxfordshire, is 3pm on Friday 20 November 2020.

Questions and addresses should be no longer than one side of A4 paper in Arial 12 font. The statement or question will be circulated to the Panel and public speakers will be invited to speak at the virtual meeting, subject to technical arrangements being in place. Written submissions may also be read out by the Chair or Democratic Services Officer where requested or if the person making the request for public speaking is not able to attend the meeting.  A response may be given at the meeting or a written answer supplied. The Chair will have discretion to manage the public participation procedure as they see appropriate. Questions and notice of addresses must be submitted to democratic.services@oxfordshiregrowthboard.org

Ian Ashley submitted a question on behalf of Need Not Greed Oxfordshire, (NNGO). The question referred to ongoing work to refine policy options for the Oxfordshire Plan 2050 and public engagement on those options as set out in the update report to the Board. It expressed concern that in the opinion of NNGO, the current range of partners involved in the engagement did not go beyond internal local authority groupings and that unless this was addressed a confrontational situation would arise where decisions were taken behind the scenes with the public given a tick box at the end. The Growth Board was asked how it planned to test its internal assumptions and draft policy options with external stakeholders such a NNGO and CPRE prior to formal consultation. 

In response, the Chair commented that the development of the Oxfordshire Plan 2050 would continue to be supported by a comprehensive consultation and engagement process using a range of engagement methods as used during the previous Regulation 18 (Part 1) which had generate some 1,200 responses including stakeholder events. It was stressed that the report to Board made clear that the next consultation would set out a range of policy options and no decisions had been mad. The next opportunity for the Growth Board to test options with stakeholders and critical friends would be during the next consultation in 2021.Seperately, a public engagement exercise had been launched to support the development of a Strategic Vision for Oxfordshire and organisations including Need Not Greed were encouraged to part in that process.

With the permission of the Chair, Ian Ashley made a follow up point that it was the view of Need Not Greed that the policy options open to the Growth Board could be limited within an existing context of ‘build, build, build’ rather than recognising the limits to housing and job growth. Loss of countryside to concrete as recognised as a contributory factor to climate change, but he recognised that it was still part of an overriding strategy for Oxfordshire as this was the only way in HM Government funding for infrastructure could be obtained to secure the Oxfordshire Vision.  The Board needed to be explicit that this was a choice that was being made on behalf of residents, rather than an alternative approach that would do more to protect the environment.

Councillor Brown responded that Oxfordshire faced a huge affordable housing shortage and crisis and therefore it was important to also recognise the context of the need to build houses for those needing homes including the homeless whose condition was often hidden. The Board was supportive of good housing growth and developments which were sustainable but had to take housing need into consideration.

Charlie Maynard submitted a question on behalf of the Witney to Oxford Transport Group which related to the work of the Witney to Oxford Transport Group to investigate and develop proposals for a rail route from a junction with the Cotswold Line at Yarnton, through Eynsham and Witney, to Carterton and RAF Brize Norton. A presentation, setting out the detail of the Group’s work could be accessed by the Board and public here. It was felt that this strongly set out the case for a feasible route for a new route which could generate large economic and environmental benefits for West Oxfordshire.

The Group was working to quantify the costs of its proposals and was intending to apply to HM Government under the Restoring your Railway Ideas Fund to develop the idea further. The Group was in the process of securing support for the application from local MPs and local authorities and a motion supportive of the undertaking of a feasibility study, should funding be confirmed, had been supported by the Council of Oxfordshire County Council in November.

The Group acknowledged what it recognised to be critical links between improvements in capacity to existing rail infrastructure in Oxfordshire and any new rail route to Carterton and Witney and asked that members of the Board consider the proposals carefully and that the Board consider giving its support for a feasibility study, noting that this did not imply support to rebuild the railway.

At the request of the Chair, Councillor Hudspeth provided an initial response stating that a full response would be supplied in writing. He welcomed the aspiration within the question to locate housing near to rail stations on sustainability grounds as the best way to enable residents to get round the County, but stressed the importance of securing the support of Network Rail for any rail schemes as Network Rail were ultimately the decision makers on taking any scheme to HMG and have to deliver it. Councillor Hudspeth stressed that for potential schemes such as the Carterton to Oxford line to ever happen, improvements had to be made first to capacity at Oxford Station which were crucial. The costs of the works required were significant, running into many hundreds of millions of pounds. Cllr Hudspeth added that the motion agreed by Oxfordshire County Council had included a request that the county council look into the rationale of the reallocation of funding previously approved to assist delivery of the A40/A44 Strategic Link Road (via Loop Farm) to towards improvements at Oxford station, a decision taken by OxLEP in recognition of the need to support the Oxford station works. 

Councillor Liz Leffman, Oxfordshire County Council made a statement to the Growth Board in which she supported the proposals within the Investment in improved rail connectivity report and the draft letter to the Secretary of State for Transport and additionally made the case for the upgrading of the railway line between Long Hanborough and Charlbury. The Growth Board was asked to amend its letter to include reference to the North Cotswold line, to emphasise the importance of doubling the line and to request that the doubling of the line along its entire length would be included in plans for Phase 3 funding bid.

The Chair responded that the issue raised by Councillor Leffman was within the purview of Cotswold Line Taskforce as any development of service would require the support of the network’s operator. It had also not been within the remit of the Oxfordshire Rail Corridor Study which was due to be considered by the Growth Board soon. This has identified a significant gap between infrastructure current infrastructure capacity around Oxford and future demand for rail.  Investment in this area was a pre-requisite for a wider programme of service improvements including potential improvement on the Cotswold Line. The proposed letter was deliberately focussed on the pending decision of Phase 2 of the Network Rail capacity programme as the next building block in boosting capacity and therefore it was felt important to maintain this focus rather than adding additional reference to other schemes that could come forward in the future.