HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL FACLT MEMBERS!
This issue contains:
A Landmark Decision for Frome
A Tribute to Chris James
Come to our next Development Session
Our Chair’s article in the Frome Times
CLTs Across the Country
Join our Team
A Landmark Decision for Frome

Like many in Frome we are excited by the Somerset decision to sell Saxonvale to Mayday.
At last Mayday can start on their ambitious community-led plans for an extraordinary development at the heart of our town. We are thrilled to be working in partnership with Mayday on the affordable homes that make up a significant part of the project and hope that it will not be much longer before ‘spades are in the ground’ and new homes materialise.
We applaud the commitment and dedication of the Mayday team over the past seven years, in particular Damon Moore, Kate Moore and Paul Oster, and Paul Clarke from Stories. We recognise the widespread community support for the Mayday scheme on land which has been neglected for over 25 years.
We eagerly anticipate a period where the people of Frome have their say about what they would like to see on the site and look forward to being part of a sustainable development which regenerates and breathes new life into our town centre.
Frome residents win five-year battle for community-led housing project
Mayday Saxonvale scheme is given the go-ahead after an extraordinary meeting of Somerset council executive

Mayday supporters gather at the Saxonvale site in Frome. Photograph: Garfield Austin
Residents of a “renegade” Somerset market town have won their battle to create an innovative 5-hectare (12-acre) community-led development that includes homes, workspaces and a lido, after councillors agreed to sell a large brownfield site to the not-for-profit social enterprise behind the project.
The Mayday Saxonvale scheme in Frome, which hundreds of residents have spent five years fighting for, also features two public squares, and a community-owned boutique hotel and cafe.
Supporters of the project, which they believe is the largest of its kind in England, say it means that the Saxonvale site in the town centre will be saved from being turned into a “cookie-cutter” development by a commercial company more focused on its shareholders than the good of the place.
To read the whole article:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/jan/23/frome-residents-win-five-year-battle-for-community-led-housing-project
Chris James

It is with great sadness that we learned last week of the death of Chris James.
Joining the board in 2019 as a founding member he committed much time and energy to FACLT over a number of years. We highly valued his expertise in matters of governance, and his wisdom and compassion. He will be greatly missed and our thoughts are with his family and friends at this time.
Come to our next development session
At our development session in January we reviewed our Aims & Objectives and updated them for 2025. We would like to invite you to our next development meeting for your input into this process.
We will be sending out reminders nearer the date.
- Thursday 13th February
- 10:00 – 11:30 am
- Frome Town Hall
and Thank You
We were delighted by the response to our call for new members.
The Directors would like to thank those who have stepped up to help us achieve our ambition that Frome becomes a town in which all sections of our community have access to decent homes that meet their needs.
There is much to be done as outlined in our Chair John-Sebastian’s article to be published in the Frome Times. The following is a shortened version.
John-Sebastian’s Article in the Frome Times
Frome’s Continuing Housing Crisis
Currently, in Frome, 1000 households are trapped on the council waiting list for a social home.
In August 2023 Frome Town Council in collaboration with Frome Area Community Land Trust (FACLT) declared a housing crisis. Since then the crisis has deepened further. Currently, there are 678 households on the housing waiting list who have a local connection and want to remain living in Frome.
According to government figures for England published in 2024 there has been a total loss of more than 177,000 social homes in England in the past ten years.
The National Housing Federation has estimated that there are 1.3 million households in England trapped on council waiting lists for a social home.
This local and national crisis is a direct result of the failure by “successive governments to fund and build social housing”.
Frome Area Community Land Trust can be part of the solution.
1) We can promote Community Led Housing, building for social and community benefit to meet the needs of the local community. This can be achieved through developers and landowners such as Somerset Council working with us. Crucially the social homes built through this arrangement are not subject to the right to buy and remain available for the community in perpetuity.
2) We can campaign with Frome Town Council and other organisations for a change to planning policy that mandates developers to build a minimum of 40% social homes on any development.
3) We can campaign locally and with our national organisation – The Community Land Trust Network – for other measures, e.g.
- increased government funding held by local authorities for social housing,
- increased government funding for community led housing,
- new rules so that council owned land can only be sold for community benefit and social homes.
CLTs across the country
The CLT Network (CLTN) sends out regular newsletters keeping us up to date with CLT activity across the UK – it is interesting to read about what is going on elsewhere in the country and what the network has achieved in terms of new National Planning Policy guidance for CLTs at a local level with its lobbying and feedback to central government.
Currently, the CLTN is campaigning for workable ‘Community Right to Buy’ legislation to ‘create neighbourhood-level power sharing arrangements between councils and community organisations’.
More locally Middlemarch – our Wessex advisory organisation – has sent out a Winter 2024 newsletter identifying 69 new CLT homes for social rent across the district with many more in the pipeline. We can now add Frome to this list. Hooray! CLTs are starting to have a very real community impact!
Middlemarch Winter 2024 Newsletter
We Need You!

As always we are looking to recruit new Directors.
If you share our commitment to seeing Frome thrive and want to play an active role in shaping its future come join us! Becoming a FACLT Director is a powerful way to make a lasting impact locally.
We are looking for anyone with a clear passion to create positive change to play a part in overseeing our community engagement, and our continuous search for opportunities to provide genuinely affordable homes for local people.
If you have any of the following skills, that would be also be amazing….
- Financial Management
- Legal Advice
- Social Media
Or if you have a few hours a week or month to volunteer please consider in 2025 becoming an active member of FACLT.
Please get in touch and we would be very pleased to arrange a coffee and chat. info@fromeareaclt.org
or Contact us
Thank you for reading this newsletter – It’s important for us to have regular contact with our members and the wider Frome community. We’d like to hear what you think of our ideas and what we’re trying to do. We would certainly like to have you on board as we work towards creating genuinely affordable housing for local people in the town. You can keep up with the latest from FACLT on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and on our website too. You can also write to us at info@fromeareaclt.org
To find us on social media use button links below
Frome Area Land Community Trust
Email: info@fromeareaclt.org
Frome Town Hall
Christchurch Street West
Frome BA11 3EB