A large number of residents have concerns over new targets for housing, and how they will affect the community over the coming years.

Labour’s new commitment to building 1.5m new houses would see local targets agreed in 2021 expand from 550 per year to 1,043 – an increase of 90 per cent!

Housing targets across the country have become mandatory again, and the Government can enforce their will on local councils such as Tendring.

The reason for these mandatory increases is the housing crisis. The population explosion seen in this country over the last two decades has been staggering.

In the last year alone, one migrant arrived in the UK every minute. The knock-on effect of mass migration is clear to see, and it is our local communities that will pay the price for successive failures by government to do anything about this issue.

My fear is that Angela Rayner’s new plans will have a negative impact, particularly on rural villages, should they be adopted.

One of the things that I love about the constituency of Clacton is its people and sense of community. But if almost double the amount of extra homes are built every year, how will local schools, GPs and roads be able to cope?

Are these homes for local people, or will they be primarily built to help solve the national housing crisis? And what benefit, if any, will current residents see from these new proposals?

I am supporting a new group set up by councillors Peter Harris and Jeff Bray - the Campaign for the Protection of Our Rural Tendring (CPORT).

They are aiming to work in lockstep with parish councils to protect rural areas, farming and the local culture.

I also intend to make a contribution in Westminster about the link between the housing crisis and mass migration before too long.

Tendring Council has a strong track record of fulfilling its obligations when it comes to housing targets and I will support the council in its effort to ask the Government to think again.

We should not allow failure by successive national governments to deal with mass migration mean forcing unrealistic and unwanted developments in Clacton and the surrounding villages.