Green Belt building up 25% despite Tory promises to protect ‘precious land’

Howard Chapman, Buildingtalk Editor on the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) report that Green Belt boundaries are being changed to get round planning restrictions and allow even more construction 

Councils say they are under Government pressure to hit high housing targets. CPRE claim some councils are misusing of an ‘exceptional circumstances’ clause to allow Green Belt to be released for building – and changing the Green Belt boundaries too.

Demand for housing and for profits

But worse still, housebuilding on Green Belt and other greenfield sites has been growing for years as demand for housing soars and cash-strapped public bodies sell off land – and the big developers maximise profits .

This is happening despite there being land available now to build on brownfield sites – as I reported in a previous Blog, building homes on brownfield sites is quicker than on greenfield land.The latest CPRE research shows there are enough derelict (brownfield) sites available and suitable for building 1,494,070 new homes – and the supply of these sites is steadily increasing.

Here are links to more details about the rape of our ‘green and pleasant land’ via Financial Times and Daily Mail reports yesterday.

We need to challenge what is happening and join the CPRE in campaigning for a strong Government commitment to uphold existing policy and carry out an urgent review of the latest threats to the Green Belt.

Buildingtalk link on Twitter about this – retweet or comment.