The future of the Green Belt

Environment portrait1“The answer’s no, what’s the question?” Peter Village QC and Jonathan Darby consider the issue of Green Belt policy ahead of the general election.

As the political battle lines are drawn in advance of next year’s general election it seems clear that, in the planning world at least, one of the major points of controversy remains the divisive issue of Green Belt policy.

The publication of further Green Belt guidance this month only serves to reinforce the prospect of continued debate surrounding the issue. In a new section on when housing and economic needs might “override constraints on the use of land, such as green belt”, the guidance says the NPPF “makes clear that, once established, green belt boundaries should only be altered in exceptional circumstances, through the preparation or review of the local plan”. As such, the new and revised guidance provides a clear example, as if one were needed, of the present Government’s commitment to safeguard the Green Belt from development largely irrespective of the lack of any genuine benefit, whether environmental or otherwise, to be gained from the indiscriminate application of an indiscriminate policy.

However, and given that many estimates suggest that the UK needs to be building upwards of 300,000 new homes a year for the foreseeable future in order to counterbalance historic shortfall, can it really be said that residential development should continue to be rigidly considered as a matter for the plan making process?

These recent developments, if indeed they are developments rather than the strains of a broken record, follow on from the RIBA report, “Building a Better Britain”, published earlier this year. That report not only called for the next Government to implement a number of recommendations in a bid to help empower towns and cities but also, more specifically, suggested that there is urgent need to assess real value of the greenbelt to allow communities to unlock housing and growth potential on wasted land.

When questioned about the new and revised guidance, Eric Pickles suggested that ”local people don’t want to lose their countryside to urban sprawl, or see the vital green lungs around their towns and cities lost to unnecessary development”. Mr Pickles’s robust approach is to say, with respect to development which by definition relies on the demonstration of very special circumstances, “The answer’s No, what’s the question?”

Such an approach is at the very least questionable for a number of reasons. First is the notion that alternative designations would necessarily result in the loss of countryside to urban sprawl rather than the proper planning and management of growth in a sustainable manner. Second, and perhaps more presciently, is the suggestion that any loss of Green Belt would be as a result of “unnecessary” development. Only those with their heads buried deep in the sand could seek to argue that an increased number of homes are not required (and required now). Why is it appropriate to rule out, at a policy stroke, the provision of these urgently needed market and affordable homes as demonstrating very special circumstances? Third, very few people (if any) are suggesting that the doors should be blown off the policy safe. Small amounts of focused release from the Green Belt could make a material contribution to achieving meaningful targets, in combination with brownfield and greenfield sites.

Surely, after the election the time would be ripe for a grown up, sensible debate as to how best to reform Green Belt policy in order to meet current and future needs, whilst appropriately protecting those parts of the countryside with genuine and meaningful environmental or amenity value.

Presently, there are a number of factors at play that foment what we perceive to be the rising unrest within the development industry. First, the changing of the guard with outgoing Housing and Planning Minister Nick Boles’ mild opposition to development in the Green Belt being replaced by the ‘over my dead body’ attitude of his successor, Brandon Lewis. Second, the ever-growing frustration over obstacles constantly being placed in the way of development notwithstanding the country’s real and tangible housing crisis. Third, the growing schism in the Coalition Government over garden cities and whether they can be delivered. Thus, whilst the Deputy Prime Minister was expounding the virtues of garden cities and talking up the prospects of building five new cities between Oxford and Cambridge, Brandon Lewis was dismissing the winning proposal of this year's Wolfson Economic Prize, run by Tory peer Lord Wolfson, before the ink was even dry on the winner’s cheque.

However, for the Government to dismiss any prospect of meaningful Green Belt release is shortsighted. Whilst the political expedience of adopting such an attitude may carry significant weight in Westminster, particularly at a time when David Cameron is desperate to slow UKIP’s progress in Tory heartlands, it simply does not stack up in planning terms when placed alongside not only the undeniable need for more houses but also the potential benefits of a ‘root and branch’ review of a policy that is no longer fit for purpose.

It is an incontrovertible truth that the core principles of Green Belt policy in England have remained relatively unchanged for over 60 years. It must also be accepted amongst even the staunchest supporters of current Green Belt policy that the success of such policy has been, at best, rather mixed. Indeed, there are many examples where, rather than protecting rural areas, the existence of a Green Belt has merely led to ‘leap-frog’ development, which has been to the detriment of many villages and settlements lying just outside the limits of the out-dated planning designation. Furthermore, the encouragement, whether unthinking or otherwise, of such development can hardly be said to be sustainable, and thus is unarguably not in compliance with the ‘golden thread’ of the National Planning Policy Framework. It leads to higher levels of commuting, prompts disparate growth and severs linkages between urban centres and the workers upon which their economies rely.

There are numerous examples of areas of Green Belt that no longer serve the policy designation’s intended purpose (many arguably serving little or no purpose at all). However, raising the possibility of reform of Green Belt policy remains something of a taboo subject and, all too frequently, local authorities misuse the planning system in order to kick difficult questions of release into the Green Belt’s long grass. This is not necessarily surprising given the planning system’s inherent propensity to favour local desires over national needs but, nevertheless, it results in a collective failure to develop in a truly sustainable manner that ensures countryside with inherent value is protected in innovative ways whilst simultaneously meeting housing need.

It is no longer appropriate to adopt and insist upon a carte blanche policy that pays little or no regard to either that housing need or the fact that large tranches of Green Belt land are of little or no residual value.

Indeed, given its indiscriminate effect, can it be said that the Green Belt is an effective mechanism to support sustainability? Does it stimulate urban regeneration? Or, does it, as we suggest, prevent sufficient homes being built and artificially inflate prices? Green Belt policy is no longer, and arguably has never been, the most appropriate (or even a suitable) means of protecting land of environmental or amenity value. Its successes have been limited and there are many more appropriate means of protecting such land that would spread the community benefits more widely. Surely populist reactions designed to woo voters are far more damaging to proper planning than alternative designations, such as strategic gaps and green wedges, which are frequently far more effective at both creating a sustainable urban form and also protecting assets of genuine environmental value.

The time has come for a sensible debate shaped by objectively assessed needs and value-based evidence that can be tested in a transparent manner rather than avoided through the application of an out-dated policy. This is the only way in which land can be utilised in an appropriate manner given current acute demand and supply challenges.

Peter Village QC and Jonathan Darby are barristers at 39 Essex Street.