Morning Carl
Having done a stint as a Parish Councillor I can only agree with your comments.
Another issue we encountered was , having been given permission to start a development with a certain percentage of Social Housing, developers when they were part way through the development reneiged on their committments due to " financial pressures " and the amount of social housing was reduced.
Happened on several occasions.
Tory District Council Planning Dept?
The reason these « refugees » want to go to the U.K. is because the U.K. is seen as a soft touch and the economic benefits for them are better than anywhere else.
If you really are fleeing conflict or persecution, you are looking for a safe haven. Why would you cross continents, then find the 3-5000 euros per person to cross a dangerous Channel if it were not for economic reasons? There are UK Embassies throughout the world where a legal demand may be made - but no, get to the U.K. and the benefit system will look after you!
In Ukraine, they are fighting for their survival of their country - why do the Afghan’s and Syrian’s etc not fight for their own freedoms? We had to in the 2 world wars. I wasn’t there but it was a huge sacrifice which I doubt would be repeated in today’s Woke/gender bender communities.
The whole ECHR and Refugee circus needs updating and reforming to sort out the legitimate claims by those in need and not just to accept any Tom, Dick, or Ahmed, claiming that they are gay and therefore cannot be sent back home for fear of persecution.
We need to start by getting rid of spineless politicians and empowering more courageous representatives like Suella on both sides of the Channel.
Minority groups always make the most noise, but the general population is often ignored.
Public opinion in the U.K. (and in France) is against immigration but all we get is reasons why we should care for immigrants whilst leaving our own homeless and elderly in conditions far worse than Manston.
My views of course ( reflected by a considerable number of the silent majority) but I now expect the usual tirade of comments from the lefty community. Here we go……
It’s typical Andy - it pretty much always happens - see my comment above:
Enabling private developers to build more houses will make the problem worse, as well as increasing negative environmental impacts, because they will do what comes naturally, and precisely what they have been doing - build the wrong kind of houses (big profitable houses for the relatively well-off, not affordable homes).
Of course the UK Tory press is full of articles about how private companies need to have more land and more ‘freedom’ to build more houses. It’s nonsense - it will make the situation worse just as it has been doing - and the only reason it’s in the press is that it’s put there by lobbying by those very companies.
Not necessarily Graham - although it is Tory administered councils in the main that block new housing purely by dint of their general locations : the Shires, Home Counties, rural areas etc., and their demographic.
As for housebuilder reneging on their commitments, I do think that it is shameful that this happens but can understand some of the reasoning behind it. General housebuilders work to a margin of circa 6 to 8 percent and rely upon getting a few houses built and sold to fund further work on site. In my line of work, we develop apartments for the elderly and work to much higher margins - purely because we have to outlay the whole land and development cost (construct the whole scheme) before we get a penny back in profit (sell any apartments). As you can imagine, this puts a tremendous strain on cashflow and reserves - especially in times such as we are living through today. As for providing ‘affordable’ units within our schemes, this really doesnt work for reasons of social cohesion and practicality of responsibilities. If we were to provide units in this manner, we would have to gift them to a social housing provider and this would then lead to issues of responsibility for maintenance and management - we, as a company, are not allowed in law to provide these services as we are not, and can never be, a social housing provider. For general housebuilders, the situation is different in that they are providing individual houses with clearly defined boundaries and independent Titles. We fulfil our obligations in this regard by making a financial contribution via a S106 agreement to the local authority - which can run into many hundreds of thousands of pounds if not a million or two. It is then up to them how that money is spent…
Similar experiences to yours…
used to make me furious, how a good idea was sidetracked into something naff… 
and no, @graham it wasn’t Tory Planning…
Why did you accept this?
Surely the approval/ contract would include the imposition of penalties that would make it easier for them to just do what they promised?
If you’ve not been involved in local government/parish council stuff… it might well seem astonishing…
but I can confirm that time and time again, permision might be given for something which seemed ideal locally… and, as things progressed “problems” would arise… needing to revist and amend original details… never ending happily for the local community.
and, no… we didn’t take this lying down… we fought every step of the way… but big business has its own way of doing things… huh.
It is hugely common. Not helped by the Tories changing legislation on the legal minimum social housing. But often the developer has the local authority by the short and curlies, and hugely hard to force the issue to the extreme.
In previous days a lot of land was owned and developed by the local authority (even if sub contracted to private developer) so a very different scenario.
Morning Karen
We were a small cog in a big machine, with very limited influence. Money talks
Don’t get me started on Open Cast Mining planning applications
‘beholden to their voter base’
Sounds like a brilliant idea to me.
One again the pejorative phrase 'illegal immigrant" is used to vilify refugees.
It’s not illegal until a court rules so.
Or do the Conservatives plan to dismiss the awkward judicial system as interfering with freedom.
But it’s not surprising that ordinary people make this mistake when government ministers make it all the time, eg.
On Times Radio on Friday, Chris Philp, a former immigration minister who was handed the policing brief in the most recent cabinet reshuffle, said: “If people choose to enter a country illegally, and unnecessarily, it is a bit, you know, it’s a bit of a cheek to then start complaining about the conditions."
But these people are NOT illegal immigrants - more than three quarters of applicants are granted asylum, so are completely innocent of any wrong-doing. The problem is that this sort of language - or, in short, lying - is the norm for the Tory party, and the UK media is so supine it never picks it up. A good interviewer would immediately say: “But they’re NOT illegal, are they, Minister? They are in fact victims that you are treating as criminals.”
And I can’t tell you how appalled I am that this minister has now been ‘handed the policing brief’. How can the UK possibly expect to get the endemic corruption out of its police service when the people in charge of it lie about who is a criminal and who is innocent ?
It’s not benefits that an asylum seeker is allowed, it’s asylum support and it’s £40.85 a week and no cost housing. Housing is often a room. No choice on accommodation or city. Children aged 1 to 3 mean an extra £3 per week. Nothing generous about these figures. Asylum support: What you'll get - GOV.UK
Asylum seekers are not allowed to work until they are accepted as refugees and this takes months, sometimes years.
Until last year it was usual that one third of applicants are successful first time. On appeal another one third were successful. Last year figures jumped to 72% which is something to do with Brexit and no longer being part of the EU whole. How many people do we grant asylum or protection to? - GOV.UK
Homosexuality is a death sentence in some countries. Proving your sexuality is not easy.
The fact that the “journalists” so very rarely push back on comments made by politicians is a big part of the problems that we now face.
Even those with formal training in journalism seem to view their role as that of mere presenter, though there also seems to be a bias which means that opposition party politicians are much more liikely to get interrupted, cut short or asked (when the FPTP system and a large Tory majority actually leaves them powerless) “what are *you* going to do about it”.
True.
In fact not even those NOT granted asylum are “illegal”, as long as they are either appealing the decision, or waiting for arrangements to be made to repatriate them. The latter point being especially difficult when that is to a country known not to be safe, even if it is not felt heir own situation warrants the granting of asylum.
Exactly!!! The UK has always been built on the backs of economic migrants - mostly doing the work that nobody else wanted to do! If proper channels (no pun intended) existed for migrants to acquire work permits it would go some of the way to addressing this fiasco. 
Perfectly fine - so long as they follow the rules and make decisions in accordance with their Local Plan Policies - otherwise it is just the Wild West.
Fudley pet, have you no idea how amusing you are? Indeed, why don’t the bloody foreigners just sort themselves out and as for “I wasn’t there … but… “ 
Have you thought of scriptwriting (more just stating your views) for Alan Partridge or Rickey Gervais?