New housing plan approved for small Somerset village

The village of Oake lies between two main road in the former Taunton Deane area - the A38 between Taunton and Wellington, and the B3227 between Taunton and Wiveliscombe (via Milverton).

The parish council and local residents have been working since late-2017 to create a Neighbourhood Plan, which identifies key characteristics of the village which should be protected and enhanced in the wake of any new housing.

Following a local referendum, this plan has been formally ratified by Somerset Council, meaning it will serve as a key basis in future decision-making.

The new Neighbourhood Plan includes the entire village of Oake along with its neighbouring hamlets of Heathfield, Hillcommon and Hillfarrance.

The village includes the popular Oake Manor Golf Club - the scene where the merger of Taunton Deane Borough Council and West Somerset Council was formally agreed, in what was described by one contemporary councillor as a "shotgun wedding".

While the Neighbourhood Plan does not allocate any specific sites for new residential or commercial development, it does include a design guide to ensure that all new homes which are approved blend in with the existing character of the village.

The plan also highlights a number of green spaces which should be protected from development (including the primary school's playing fields) and includes aspiration for improved walking and cycling links, both within the village and with the neighbouring settlements of Milverton and Norton Fitzwarren.

The draft Neighbourhood Plan went to a referendum of local residents on October 23 - with around 97 per cent of those who participated voting in favour of the proposals.

Following this result, Somerset Council's planning and transport policy executive sub-committee agreed to formally adopt the Neighbourhood Plan into its wider planning policies when it met in Taunton on December 10.

Councillor Sarah Wakefield, portfolio holder for adults services, housing and homelessness, sought assurances from officers that this Neighbourhood Plan (and others) would be taken seriously when it came to future housing developments.

Ms Wakefield (who represents the neighbouring Blackdown and Neroche division) said: "I get a lot of this from my parish councils, where they make Neighbourhood Plans but, frankly, they get squashed when we don't have a five-year housing land supply.

"Some of my ten parishes have been thinking about doing Neighbourhood Plans, but they are now saying to me that they don't see the point."

Ann Rhodes, the council's principal planning policy officer, responded: "We have to balance many different considerations, but the the starting point will always be the policies within our development plan framework."

Councillor Sarah Wakefield, portfolio holder for adults' services, housing and homelessness (Image: Somerset Council)

Kate Murdoch, the council’s service manager for planning policy and implementation, added that the weight of the Oake Neighbourhood Plan would be defined by how well it met local need in the face of speculative applications.

She said: "The key problem is whether or not a Neighbourhood Plan has made sufficient allocations.

"If they have made allocations, and the Plan is less than five years old, and those allocations meet the local need, they have a greater weight in terms of protecting from speculative applications.

"The problem we have is that many of our Neighbourhood Plans don't make any allocations - and that doesn't stop a speculative application coming in and being granted on appeal. That has happened in some instances nationally."

The Oake Neighbourhood Plan will become part of the council's existing planning policies for the former Taunton Deane area, which were inherited by Somerset Council when the former district councils were abolished in April 2023.

Oake, Bradford & Nynehead Church of England Primary School in Oake (Image: Daniel Mumby)

It will in turn be carried over as part of the new Somerset Local Plan, which is expected to be adopted in the spring of 2029 - with the first round of public consultation on allocated sites due to take place in the coming months.

Ms Wakefield said small Somerset villages like Oake needed to move with the times, acknowledging the need for development where it met local need.

She opined: "I've always said to all my villages: 'you're going to have to have some development'. We can't sit here and pretend a given place is a static village.

"Where I live, and at my age, most of my friends in the village all want to move somewhere smaller, and they're not building anything in our village - so they're going to have to move away or build something themselves.

"This is not a protection against development; it is more about saying: 'this is what we would like to see in our village'."