Leeds local elections 2023: Garforth and Swillington Independents commit to ‘fighting urban sprawl’

David Spereall, Local Democracy Reporter
By David Spereall, Local Democracy Reporter
Published 15th Apr 2023, 11:45 BST
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This piece is part of a series of interviews with local party leaders across Leeds ahead of the local elections on May 4.

The Garforth and Swillington Independents Group has urged local voters to continue backing them at the upcoming local elections in Leeds.

The group, which currently holds all three city council seats in Garforth and Swillington, claims it has an “excellent track record” in delivering for local people.

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In a pre-election pitch to residents, group leader Councillor Mark Dobson said he and colleagues were helping to protect Garforth and its surrounding areas from “urban sprawl” and from losing the ward’s “uniqueness”.

Garforth and Swillington Independents group leader Councillor Mark Dobson said he and colleagues were helping to protect Garforth and its surrounding areas from “urban sprawl” and from losing the ward’s “uniqueness”.Garforth and Swillington Independents group leader Councillor Mark Dobson said he and colleagues were helping to protect Garforth and its surrounding areas from “urban sprawl” and from losing the ward’s “uniqueness”.
Garforth and Swillington Independents group leader Councillor Mark Dobson said he and colleagues were helping to protect Garforth and its surrounding areas from “urban sprawl” and from losing the ward’s “uniqueness”.

Councillor Dobson, a onetime Labour frontbencher who left the party in 2017, also took aim at his former colleagues for Leeds’ Year of Culture 2023, which he branded a “waste of money”.

In an interview on Thursday, Councillor Dobson said: “First and foremost we look after the ward and we try to make sure the ward is protected, in terms of it being a semi-rural community. We’ve always got one eye on what we believe to be avaricious and inappropriate development.”

Councillor Dobson cited the battle over the council’s site allocations plan (SAP), as an example of how being free of the Labour whip had helped his group fight for Garforth and Swillington.

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The plan, which earmarked sites for housing across the city, had to be heavily altered in 2020 following a High Court ruling and opposition councillors complaining of overdevelopment. In the end, 37 greenbelt sites were removed from the SAP.

Councillor Dobson described the original proposals as a “developer’s dream”.

He added: “We do worry about urban sprawl and we don’t worry about it because we’re NIMBYs. We worry about it because we don’t see any supporting infrastructure. We don’t see anything except a strain on already creaking services, school provision and highways.”

Councillor Dobson said that besides daily “bread-and-butter” work helping local residents, his group had also been an effective voice on “big ticket” issues affecting all of Leeds, citing a pledge secured to retain independent oversight of its child safeguarding procedures, which have come under heavy scrutiny this year.