Cambs Unitaries Campaign and the future of Cambridgeshire

Come along to the event on 08 March 2025 at the Mill Road Community Centre and find out more about what the future holds for our city and county

People of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, you are cordially invited by the Cambs Unitaries Campaign (founded by Chris, Martin, and Phil) – of which I am a member too, to our event on the 08 March 2025 at the recently completed Mill Road Community Centre, which is round the back of the old Mill Road Library by the railway bridge.

Above – if you see a building that looks like this (i.e. the old library), turn slightly to your left. That’s where the entrance is to the Mill Road Community Centre.

(Personally I think the development should have incorporated the Mill Road Library into a new, larger centre, but local government turf wars combined with austerity said no)

“What will you be talking about?”

The basic agenda is:

“AGENDA

1. Annual Report
2. Accounts
3. Election of Committee
4. Discussion of any Motions
   (end of formal AGM)

General Discussion on the Best Approach to be Adopted for Determining Unitary Authority Boundaries“

“What is the best approach to be adopted for deciding the boundaries?”

Cambridge City Council are meeting on Monday 17th March 2025 at The Guildhall

Cambridgeshire County Council are meeting on Tuesday 18th March 2025 at Alconbury

South Cambridgeshire District Council thus far have not scheduled a meeting but I expect they will do before the initial deadline set by ministers for initial proposals from local councils which is on 21 March 2025 – which I wrote about here.

Recap – Cambs Unitaries Campaign public meeting April 2024

You can see my write-up here. Essentially local councils (and through them, the rest of us) are being asked a very similar set of questions that were put to the county in the early 1990s – that restructure resulting in the creation of a new Peterborough Unitary Council.

Above – some of the options considered (and rejected) in the review of the mid-1990s (Cambridge Evening News 23 Sept 1993 from the British Newspaper Archive – See my commentary in Lost Cambridge here)

The final recommendations from the Boundary Commission were published in 1995 – I somehow found a copy going on sale and digitised the Huntingdon and Peterborough section here. At the time there was little appetite for a Cambridge unitary authority – certainly not from the safe Conservative-voting district of south Cambridgeshire. Fast forward 30 years and Cambridge’s population has increased by 50% and the housing crisis and growth in house-building – driven by employment growth in the sci-tech sector has resulted in the significant party-political change in South Cambridgeshire district, moving from a Conservative-controlled district with two Blue MPs to a Lib-Dem-controlled district with *three* LibDem MPs.

With significant population and economic growth being proposed by the present government, inheriting their predecessors’ proposals, it’s not just the cities and county of the present that we need to look at, but of the future as well, if politicians wish to avoid another restructure in twenty years time.

Below populations from the 2021 census

Above – via the Cambs Unitaries Campaign here, there are a number of caveats with the Government’s guidance on a 500,000 population minimum for future unitary council areas. While Cambridge and South Cambs appear to be 200,000 short, we don’t know what the proposals from Peter Freeman and the Cambridge Growth Company are. What we do know is that the Minister for Housing, Matthew Pennycook MP has instructed Mr Freeman to go beyond what the original and emerging local plans have proposed. (You can see the emerging local plan pages here)

Greater Cambridge Local Plan First Proposals

From the document library here, the first report of the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service produced an estimate of the number of new homes needed based on the evidence submitted to it further down the document library list.

Above – Greater Cambridge Local Plan First Proposals p21

Given the multiplier of over 2 people per new home / housing unit, we’re looking at a population increase of around 100,000 people in the next 20 years across Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire. Which is substantial. Hence sites like Waterbeach Newtown, Cambridge Airport, the Cambridge Sewage Works, and Cambourne have been selected in order to reduce the requirement needed in existing towns and villages.

Note none of the above will include any *additional* new towns that may be proposed by Mr Freeman or by the Chancellor and Deputy Prime Minister in the next few months. We know that ministers are already looking at 100 proposals submitted to them from across England. My prediction is that at least one of them will be east of Cambridge on the Cambridge-Bury St Edmunds line. Therefore on paper at least, and all other things being equal (i.e. no climate catastrophe or ecological implosion – strong assumptions I know), Getting to that 500,000 target set by ministers seems reasonably achievable for Greater Cambridge as it currently is.

As I’ve said before, my preference for any restructure is more along the lines of what Lord Redcliffe-Maud proposed in 1969 – that was incorporated into Labour’s manifesto for the 1970 General Election which they lost.

Above-left, detail from the proposed restructure for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough. Above-right – from the Royal Commission’s summary pamphlet 1969 here.

Anyway, do come along to the meeting – we’ll have posters for you to look at and copies of maps for you to draw all over. And for those of you who are wondering what to do to strengthen democracy given the more worrying news coming over from the other side of the Atlantic, I’ve decided to start with the basics. With books on democracy. Lots of them. Feel free to lobby your county council candidates about getting our county libraries stocked with them too!

Food for thought?

If you are interested in the longer term future of Cambridge, and on what happens at the local democracy meetings where decisions are made, feel free to:

• Follow me on BSky <- A critical mass of public policy people seem to have moved here (and we could do with more local Cambridge/Cambs people on there!)
• Like my Facebook page
• Consider a small donation to help fund my continued research and reporting on local democracy in and around Cambridge.