thetimes.co.uk/tto/environment/article4042634.ece Housing boom on the green belt Reforms are forcing councils to accept large developments against their will Ben Webster Environment Editor Published at 12:01AM, March 24 2014 Six thousand new homes are planned for the green belt each month, as councils come under growing pressure to allocate land to meet house-building targets, a report will say today. The number of homes earmarked for green belts — protected areas around towns and cities designed to prevent urban sprawl — has risen from 81,000 in August 2012 to 200,000 today, an increase of 150 per cent in 18 months, according to the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE). In a report on the first two years of the Government’s planning regime, the CPRE says that the reforms are forcing councils to accept large developments against their will in all parts of the country, from Devon to Derbyshire and Suffolk to Staffordshire. The National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) requires councils to draw up plans identifying enough sites for housing to meet their share of national demand, which has been estimated at 240,000 a year to cope with a growing population and ease pressure on the housing market. If local authorities fail, any applications in their areas are determined according to a “presumption in favour of sustainable development”. The effect is a rushing-through of plots for development, the CPRE said. More than 700,000 homes have been proposed by councils in the countryside and the “vast majority” of those are on greenfield sites, according to the CPRE. Some councils, such as Reigate and Banstead Borough Council in Surrey, were being pushed into allocating land for development in the green belt because it comprised most of their available land, the CPRE said. Previously developed sites, known as brownfield land, are being ignored by developers because the planning framework allows them to focus house-building on undeveloped greenfield land, where their profits will be greater. The report says that only a quarter of local authorities propose to prioritise brownfield sites over greenfield, because the NPPF does not give enough support for them to do so. Two thirds of appeals for developments of ten homes or more have been decided in favour of developers in the past year, it was also found. Only 32 per cent of such appeals were upheld in the year to March 2009, according to government figures, suggesting that developers are now twice as likely to prevail when councils try to block plans. The CPRE said that councils were increasingly reluctant to defend appeals because of the risk of incurring costs, which can run to hundreds of thousands of pounds. The report identifies several towns and villages facing large increases in population because developers are planning to build on countryside around them. More than 1,300 homes are planned for Lancashire town of Warton, where the population would double if all are built. The population of Kentford, Suffolk, could treble under plans for 340 homes. Other towns and villages facing expansion include Ashbourne, Derbyshire, with plans for up to 1,050 homes; Buntingford, Hertfordshire, with 825 homes; and Four Marks in Hampshire with 350 homes. In December the National Trust found that slightly more than half of councils with green belts said that they were likely or very likely to allocate some of that land for development. Shaun Spiers, the CPRE’s chief executive, said: “Far from community control of local development, we are seeing councils under pressure to disregard local democracy to meet top-down targets. Local authorities are having to agree fanciful housing numbers and allocate huge areas of greenfield land to meet them.” Nick Boles, the planning minister, said that green-belt development was at its lowest for more than 20 years. He said that the CPRE report contained inaccuracies and was “based on a spurious analysis of the facts”. His spokesman declined to give details of the alleged inaccuracies. The Home Builders Federation said construction had increased by 25 per cent since the start of the Help to Buy scheme last April, but the 110,000 homes built in England in 2013 fell well short of the 240,000 needed. It said more than 70 per cent of new homes were built on brownfield land. Ministers want to spare people who intend to extend their homes the cost of a council levy for affordable housing. Planned changes to section 106 charges would also apply to developers of schemes of ten houses or fewer. Eric Pickles, the Communities Secretary, said: “People who have worked hard and saved hard should be able to build a home or make changes to their property without . . . excessive charges.”
Posted on: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 09:35:38 +0000
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