So who are these homes aimed at and who will this unrecognisable town centre serve? Strange that what we are celebrating is the loss of a retail resource once famous across Lancashire & Yorkshire to be replaced by 2,000 homes in the MSOA area which already has Oldham’s highest no of claims not only for housing benefit but also for every other working aged benefit as well. Homes on the border of 2 wards, St Mary’s and Coldhurst, where almost 2 in every 5 people are born abroad, where female economic inactivity is the lowest in all Greater Manchester and where fertility rates are 60% higher than the national average. 3,302 adult migrants arrived in Oldham in the last year to June 2023 the highest number ever recorded plus an undisclosed number of dependants and an additional 900 asylum seekers resident at any one time and most of these people are living in central Oldham. How are 2,000 homes built over many years going to have any impact on such unsustainable levels of immigration and where are the jobs? Oldham Council already failed to deliver over 8,000 jobs promised in the last 12 years at Foxdenton, Hotel Future, Hollinwood Junction, Prince’s Gate amongst others. In half a generation politicians have abused people’s welcoming acceptance of new arrivals choosing to accelerate immigration to the point that you have displaced the traditional communities of central Oldham making them minorities and cultural strangers in their own areas.
