The Government Inspectors initial report was sent to Sheffield City Council in January, and stated that, with one or two minor modifications, the Sheffield plan was sound and legal in their opinion.

Despite hearing evidence from many groups, including ours, and receiving thousands of letters of objection, the Government Inspectors think the plan should go ahead. We suspect that this decision is driven by central Government, who have made it very clear that they want to see one and a half million new homes built across the UK as quickly as possible.

Local elections coming up!

Sheffield Council still have to vote on the plan, and this vote will take place AFTER the local elections in May. In 2025 Labour and the Green Party councillors voted in favour of the Sheffield plan, whilst the Lib Dems voted against. Reform say they are against building on greenbelt land.

However, even if SCC vote the plan down, it is likely that Central Government will step in and force the City to adopt the plan.

Our proposed plan

We agree with the Sheffield Greenbelt Alliance Group: Greenbelt land should be removed from the plan and replaced with additional brownfield land. We also recognise that hard-up local councils across the UK are being incentivised by central Government to adopt greenbelt development plans, which makes it harder for local councils to follow the wishes of their constituents.

  1. We need to let any prospective developer know that building on this site would be financial suicide for a whole host of reasons to do with the land, the access, the drainage, the restrictions, the buffer zones, and the size of “plot” that can actually be built on in the end. We recognise that Sheffield City Council are going to do everything they can to convince a developer that the site is viable, because they own the land and stand to make a huge revenue from the Horse Field if it is developed.
  2. If (and it’s a big if) it comes to light that planning permission is being sought for Horse-Field development, we could bring forward our own plan of what level of impact would be acceptable to the Village.
  3. If any development goes ahead we will demand investment in our village for ther benefit of residents, and put forward a list of initiatives that our village would like to see supported

We believe that many Sheffield City Councillors are unaware of the real impact of green-belt development on communities like ours. Please write to them and tell them how you feel. Follow this LINK to go to our page which includes a list of Sheffield City Councillor email addresses.

We plan to hold public meetings soon to discuss these ideas as a village and finalise our plans before the SCC vote.