Green Councillors’ Column

As we head into winter, we wanted to share a few important updates from your Green councillors about what’s been happening in and around Syston this month.
Many of you will remember the heavy rain and flood alerts in mid-November. Thankfully, Syston avoided significant flooding this time, and as always want to say thanks for the brilliant work of our local flood wardens and volunteers. Behind the scenes, we continue to push the Environment Agency, Severn Trent and the County Council to deal with blocked drains, improve maintenance, and deliver the long-term flood-defence work our area still needs.
One bit of positive progress is the new Flood Locker Scheme, providing up to £10,000 for communities hit by flooding to install equipment and a secure locker so volunteers can reach it quickly during an emergency. Greens were instrumental in pushing for this scheme and getting it adopted by the Borough Council, and we’re hopeful that Syston’s flood locker will be installed very soon.
This month also saw the first-ever Coats for All event in Syston, which was a great success. Huge thanks to everyone who donated or helped out. It was wonderful to see the community come together to support local families and reduce waste at the same time.
You will also have heard about the Taylor Wimpey proposal for 1,100 houses on the edge of Syston. As many residents will know, we’ve been pushing back on large-scale developments for years because our roads, schools, GP surgeries and other essential services simply cannot keep up. We’ll be objecting to this application and will attend any future Plans Committee to speak on Syston’s behalf.
A quick but important note:
If you signed a petition or responded to Taylor Wimpey’s initial consultation in September, please be aware that you will still need to submit a fresh objection once the full planning application goes live on the Charnwood planning portal.
Unfortunately, petitions often count as a single response, whereas individual objections carry much more weight in the final decision. We’ll keep residents fully updated as soon as the application is published.
Finally, as this is the last edition before the festive break, we want to wish everyone in Syston a safe, warm and Happy Christmas.