Berkeley Homes To Submit New Proposal In Spring 2026 For 1000 Homes In NW Southwater.

Save Rural Southwater supports organic village development that is planned and managed – housing that is constructed to high-quality design and environmental standards, financially accessible to a broad range of potential homeowners, and supported with infrastructure, employment opportunities, and access to facilities.

We believe the scale of development coming our way is completely unsustainable and would be to the considerable detriment of all existing residents.

Current situation

Southwater’s population is approximately 11,500. A surge in house-building since 2000 onwards has seen the village grow by about 60%. And it is ear-marked to grow much further.

Housing developments already approved, plus those that are planned and likely to be approved, will add a further 5,500 people to the village. The Government Planning Inspector has instructed Horsham District Council to add another strategic site to its Local Plan – possibly Buck Barn – in addition to Southwater. That means up to 13,000 more people using the same congested and pot-holed roads, dentists and GP surgeries, over-stretched hospitals and public services.

Berkeley Homes’ ‘Broadacres’ development was originally approved for 594 homes back in 2015. Phases 1-3 were completed two years ago, and beyond some earth works completed at the same time, there has been no work on the approved phases 4-5 since. So, over 40% of Broadacres is not yet built (that’s 251 houses). Like any developer, Berkeley Homes will only build houses as fast or slow as they can sell them. They will do anything to protect their house prices and profits.

The recent permission to build a further 800 new homes at Horsham golf course, with ongoing development in Southwater, will effectively merge our village into Horsham, Christ’s Hospital and Tower Hill. Village expansion also extends southwards towards Shipley (and potentially Buck’s Barn), and westward to Broadbridge Heath.

Berkeley Homes’ plan for the north end of the village includes industrial units, travellers pitch, signalisation of Hop Oast roundabout, another road entering Hop Oast, and ignores the need for good, safe, pedestrian and cycle links to Horsham.

We expect Berkeley Homes to submit its latest application early next year. When their plans are published on the H.D.C. planning portal, and open to public comments, Save Rural Southwater website will offer information to guide your responses.

What can we do?

1. When Berkeley Homes submits its planning application in early 2026, we can all make individual objections via the Horsham District Council website.
   

2. We will call for a public meeting in Southwater to make our voices heard.
   

3. Meanwhile, ask questions of Southwater Parish Council, your Horsham District Councillors, and M.P. John Milne. Email your concerns john.milne.mp@parliament.uk 
   

4. Take the opportunity to meet your MP and councillors at surgery events.

What about infrastructure?

All new house-building proposals should be assessed according to whether the following infrastructure will be in place by the time homes are occupied:

Health provision

• 1,000 more homes will bring another 2,400 more people accessing already inadequate healthcare. What will that mean for access to dentists, GPs and consultants, hospital treatment waiting lists, emergency response times, and waiting time in A&E?

Education

• Berkeley Homes has identified a site for a Southwater secondary school and a second primary school. However, they would not be required to build the schools – that task and cost falls to tax-payers.

• It is likely that the West of Ifield development (10,000 homes) will receive a secondary school before Southwater ever does. So it could be ten years or more before the village gains a secondary school.

• Projected future demand for school places comes from additional houses. The recent shortfall in secondary school places has been helped by Millais going co-ed.

• At Broadbridge Heath, the promised school was not delivered and used instead for more houses.

• Pupil numbers at Southwater Infant and Junior schools are falling.

• A secondary school in Southwater would serve not only the village but other developments around Horsham, resulting in more cars and buses on the roads every morning and afternoon.

Transport

• Southwater does not have reliable and convenient public transport options capable of transporting 5,500 more people

• Our roads are already congested and cannot cope with 4,000 more cars.

• There is a high risk of greater congestion, e.g. Worthing Road going through the village and at Hop Oast Roundabout.

Utilities

• Our current electricity supply is unreliable: hundreds of households in our area suffer frequent power cuts. How will this be improved, not made worse?

• Our gas supply is also unreliable. How will this be improved, not made worse?

• Gatwick’s expansion could take priority over residential energy needs.

• Horsham area’s only water source is the Hardham aquifer which is a finite and already inadequate supply. There are currently no plans for a new reservoir or water transfers. More and more developments get around this by sinking boreholes which may prove unreliable and expensive. On current projections, one day there simply won’t be water in our taps and fire hydrants.

What about actual housing needs and suitability?

Southwater should have a balanced range of house types to meet actual local need, rather than an oversupply of the large homes favoured by developers for higher profits. Has Berkeley Homes actually provided the housing needs specified in the Southwater Neighbourhood Plan? It has built houses that local people can’t afford and which Berkeley Homes sells to international investors (they advertised Broadacres on Chinese social media).

What about local democracy?  

• Horsham District Council Planning committee is being reduced to 11 councillors who will be trained in prioritising and delivering the Government’s priorities rather than observing hard fought local district and neighbourhood planning controls: this means less accountability and fewer voices to hold authorities to account.

  
  

• In the recent appeal on the Horsham golf course housing development, the Government’s Planning Inspector criticised HDC’s ‘failure to cooperate’ with the un-met housing demand of neighbouring areas such as Crawley. He said the Horsham District land supply was ‘lamentable’ and that ‘very little weight could be attached to the Neighbourhood Plan’. There has been little official pushback on this absurd notion, which rides a coach and horses through hard fought local planning policies.

  
  

• National Planning Policy Framework (amended February 2025) will significantly reduce the weighting attached to Horsham’s Local Plan and Southwater Neighbourhood Plans.

  
  

• The Government is prioritising housebuilding as a national goal and is reducing opportunities for public participation. It is also slashing environmental protections, and is prepared to trash nature if it gets in the way of construction. A good example of this is the recent withdrawal of Natural England’s ‘Water Neutrality’ policy – a stunning reversal of position and one which is fundamentally at odds with statutory safeguards established under the Habitats Directive which, in the absence of yet further legal reform, continues to apply.

  
  

• The Government is also whittling down the percentage of affordable homes, in line with developers’ demands to protect their profits.

  
  

• New Local Plan timetables may be fast-tracked, and may require quicker responses from public and private stakeholders, meaning bad decisions and undesirable outcomes may slip through.

Other things to consider

• How do we know what obligations for community benefits are being negotiated between Horsham District Council and housebuilders under the mechanism known as Section 106?

• There will be many years of construction noise and inconvenience to residents during building phases.

• How can further commercial house-building provide more social housing and innovative solutions such as ‘co-housing’? How could it provide more than the bare minimum space requirements?

•  What is HDC doing to ensure that existing, empty buildings are being converted to housing?

Warnings in the press...

Sussex World 10/11/25

‘Concerns over plans for housing on West Sussex land originally ear-marked for new school’

Developers Vistry Homes have lodged a planning application with Horsham District Council to build 92 new homes on the land south of Broadbridge Way in Broadbridge Heath … Meanwhile they are seeking a formal discharge of a Section 106 agreement which originally designated the land for a new primary school.

Guardian 8/11/25

Reeves has repeatedly trumpeted the virtues of slashing nature rules to make it easier for homes to be built, and maligned the bats, newts and spiders that might get in the builders’ way.

She recently boasted to a tech conference hosted by US bank JP Morgan that she had unblocked a development of 20,000 homes that were being held up by a rare snail after she was approached by a developer. These homes had initially been blocked by Natural England because the Sussex area was at risk of running out of water.

Financial Times 1/11/25

Millions of people need homes. That’s not up for debate. But confusing need with demand has caused a massive policy failure… Planning needs reform, but the reason why not enough homes are being built is because not enough are being bought.

Volume housebuilders, which typically build houses rather than flats, only build them as fast as they can sell them…

So while huge numbers of people need a home, there are far fewer who can afford to buy one in the current housing market, due to higher mortgage rates and the difficulty of saving for a deposit…

So why don’t housebuilders just reduce their prices? Because they will do just about anything – ensure any hardship – before resorting to that.