Green Belt: Basildon and Billericay

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Gen Kitchen.)

I am delighted to have secured this debate after entering the ballot many times.

The origins of the green belt go back certainly to the start of the last century, but perhaps even further, because in 1580 Elizabeth I tried to impose a block on building within three miles of the City of London, in order to prevent the spread of plague. Today, I will talk a little about the Green Belt (London and Home Counties) Act 1938, the Town and Country Planning Act 1947, and a large area of land now known as the green belt.

Almost two thirds of undeveloped land in the Basildon borough is green belt, covering some 6,590 hectares. Why this debate today? Basildon council has put forward a new local plan, with a consultation that closed just a few days ago, for 27,000 homes right across the borough—the majority of which are in my constituency—covering a huge quantity of that green belt. There are 25% more homes this year on the green belt, because this Labour Government cut the need for housing in London by 17,000 properties a year and increased it in the home counties by 18,000 properties a year. All those extra properties will be heading to the green belt in constituencies such as mine across Essex and the south of England.

I congratulate my right hon. Friend and fellow Essex MP on securing this important debate. His constituency, like mine, has precious green belt that is so important to the environment, biodiversity and our physical and mental health. I acknowledge the need for housing, but does he share my concerns about this Labour Government’s central top-down targets being imposed on communities against their wishes and, equally, their plans to reclassify some of the green belt as grey belt, thereby putting our precious green belt under immense pressure and danger?

I certainly agree, and I was about to move on to that point. None of us on the Opposition Benches is against more housing, but often that housing does not come about because of local need in our constituencies. This is about a Government shying away from difficult conversations about densification in our cities, a mayor who has consistently failed to deliver on his own housing targets, and a failure to redevelop crucial brownfield land in the centre and on the edges of our major cities.

My hon. Friend’s point about the grey belt is particularly important at the moment, because the council is starting to redesignate large areas of my constituency. Just a few years ago, those areas were grade 1 or grade 2 agricultural land. Now, they are being designated as grey belt, despite never having had any buildings on them. I am concerned about what this insidious grey belt phrasing could mean for developments right across the country.

The Government will ask where the housing should go. London is a third less dense than Paris. It seems mad that we are building on virgin greenfield sites rather than densifying our cities, especially at a time when constituents in Essex and across the country are having to cross-subsidise the Mayor of London for his transport. They do not get access to it, but they have to pay for it. If we had greater density in our cities, some of those transport routes would be able to fund themselves.

Does my right hon. Friend agree not only that the Mayor of London has been given subsidies for Transport for London and has wonderful transport infrastructure links, but that he has the devolved power for housing and has not met his housing targets consistently? He has been rewarded with a reduction in housing targets, which have spilled over to the home counties.

My hon. Friend is right to make that point. The Mayor of London is being rewarded for failure, just as he was with his knighthood not that long ago. My constituents, many of whom grew up in the area or moved there for the green space nearby, now feel that they face seeing their communities concreted over because of the Mayor of London’s failure.

The green belt was designated by Conservative Governments in the 1930s and Labour Governments in the 1940s. One cannot talk about it today in the context of Basildon and Billericay without talking about Basildon council’s disastrous local plan, which is built on the destruction of the green belt. It will result in the emergence of a contiguous conurbation all the way from Shoeburyness, through the Thames gateway corridor and my constituency, into Brentwood and then through London all the way to Uxbridge on the other side. Essentially, the area from Heathrow airport to Southend airport will become part of that contiguous conurbation.

What I have to say about the green belt rests on so many conversations I have had with county, borough, town and parish councillors, but overwhelmingly on conversations with local residents across my constituency. My argument rests on four main points. First, there is overwhelming opposition to the proposals, especially in the context of London seeing a reduction in its housing targets. Secondly, there are serious concerns about existing and future local services and infrastructure, if this housing goes on the green belt. Thirdly, there will be a need for even more physical infrastructure on whatever remains of the green belt to cope with the proposed development, leading to its further erosion in the future. Fourthly, local residents have broader concerns about why the plan is being rushed through so quickly with the destruction of so much green belt, while our local councils have a gun to their head in respect of the Government’s devolution plans.

I want to be clear: residents of Basildon and Billericay are not against development per se. They are entrepreneurial, hard-working people who love their area. They are also community oriented and have stayed in Essex to raise their family or moved to Essex from London for the green space and greater sense of community. The level of building proposed is on a scale completely out of whack with what other parts of the country away from the south-east face.

I am grateful to my parliamentary neighbour for giving way. One of the most worrying things about Labour-run Basildon council’s new local plan is that 17,000 of the 27,000 proposed dwellings—just shy of two thirds of the total—are intended to be built in the green belt. Surely that is environmental and ecological vandalism.

My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. It would basically mean the merging of Wickford in his constituency with Basildon, as part of the continuous conglomeration of building that would go all the way through Greater London.

Earlier this week, the Minister for Local Government and English Devolution said in answer to my question that Basildon and Billericay residents should be proud of their council and its plans for 27,000 more properties. If every constituency in England was being asked to take what Basildon and Billericay is being asked to take, the Government would have a housing target of 12 million homes by 2040. We are bearing more than our fair share and more than is necessary. It is difficult to see how that is justified when housing targets are being cut for London.

As you can imagine, Madam Deputy Speaker, there is overwhelming local opposition to this. Central Government should be concentrating on densification of brownfield sites. There is a real fear that when the green belt is gone, the green sites left in the constituency will face immense pressure—places such Norsey Wood in Billericay, which will be the only green space for so many local residents. The pressure on the green spaces that remain will be huge, because none of the alternatives will exist.

If this plan is accepted, even with modifications, the towns and villages of the Basildon borough will become part of an amorphous mass. Villages such as Little Burstead, Great Burstead and South Green, Ramsden Bellhouse, Crays Hill and Noak Bridge just will not exist any more. They will be footnotes in the history of Labour’s plans to build, build, build.

There are serious concerns about local education provision, as we already have oversubscribed primary schools. That is particularly acute when it comes to special educational needs, with some of the services being in the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois). There are already major pressures on our green belt from the housing plan, and we are not seeing the services to go alongside it. That is particularly difficult for the green belt, because the only place where those services can be built is in that green-belt space. With the plans the council has put forward, what we are seeing is just the start of the erosion of our green belt.

I start by congratulating the right hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Holden) on securing this important debate on the green belt in his constituency. While I disagree with many of the views he has just set out, I acknowledge the strength of feeling, and in particular his views on the emerging Basildon local plan.

As the right hon. Gentleman is aware, this Government take a “brownfield first” approach to development. To that end, we made targeted changes to the national planning policy framework in December to place even stronger emphasis on the value of brownfield redevelopment, and to clarify that proposals for development on such land should be approved unless substantial harm would be caused by them. With a view to informing future policy development, we also published a brownfield passport planning reform working paper in September, setting out a series of proposals designed to prioritise and fast-track building on previously developed urban land wherever possible. None the less, we know that there are simply not enough sites on brownfield registers across the country to deliver the volume of homes that we need each year, let alone sites that are viable and in the right location.

That is why, in our first month in office, we consulted on a new approach to the green belt to support local planning authorities that face acute housing and development pressures in meeting their needs. I reiterate that the Government attach great importance to green belts and remain committed to preserving them. Green belts have served England’s towns and cities well over many decades, not least by checking the unrestricted sprawl of large built-up areas and preventing neighbouring towns from merging into one another.

The Government have not changed the five purposes of the green belt set out in paragraph 143 of the national planning policy framework, and do not propose to alter its general extent. Instead, our reforms provide for a more strategic approach to green belt land designation and release, allowing us to move away from the previous Government’s approach to the green belt, which was to allow land within it to be released regularly, in a haphazard manner, and often for speculative development that did not meet local housing need. As a result of our changes to national planning policy, local authorities must take a sequential approach to releasing land to meet their housing need: brownfield first, followed by low-quality land in the green belt, and only then higher-performing land. To identify low-performing sites, we have incorporated into the NPPF a definition of grey belt land that reflects the fact that there are areas currently designated as green belt that contribute little to it by way of aesthetic, public access or ecological value.

Mid and South Essex hospitals trust, which runs Basildon hospital, reported that in the autumn, the hospital was running at between 98% and 99% of its bed capacity. In recent weeks, because of winter pressures and flu, bed capacity has exceeded 100%. The standard NHS ratio is 2.4 new patients for each house, so 27,000 new households is just under 65,000 new patients for Basildon hospital, which is already bursting at the seams. Surely the new local plan is unsound on that score alone; Basildon hospital just cannot cope with it.

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention, and I note his concerns about hospital capacity in the area. My colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care will also have registered those comments. We are working closely with colleagues across Government to bring forward the necessary infrastructure, whether it be health or educational provision. It is for local authorities in the first instance, through the development of up-to-date local plans, to address the needs and opportunities in their area in relation to infrastructure, and—as planning policy guidance makes very clear—to bring forward infrastructure funding statements setting out what local infrastructure is needed and how it should be funded, including through the contributions made by developers.

I understand the principle, but I have read the local plan. There is not one specific word in there about plans to expand Basildon. There is an associated infrastructure delivery plan, which is a living document; it is three years out of date, and there is no specific plan in there for Basildon. I understand the theory, but Basildon borough council simply has not addressed this—it has said nothing about it at all.

I assure the right hon. Gentleman that I have heard the point he has made. He will understand that given the quasi-judicial nature of the planning system, I cannot comment on the specifics of an individual local authority’s plan, but he has put his point on the record regarding health provision in the area.

When it comes to affordable housing, our new golden rules will require a 15 percentage point premium on top of existing requirements, up to a maximum of 50%. No site-specific viability assessments will be permitted until we have strengthened national planning guidance on viability, in which we will consider the case for permitting viability negotiations on previously developed land and larger strategic sites that are likely to carry greater infrastructure costs. We have also ensured that the sustainability of sites must be prioritised. No one wants to see isolated and disconnected development, which is why our policy asks authorities to pay particular attention to transport connections when considering whether grey belt is sustainably located.

I want to make it clear that while our reforms will help deliver the homes and development that this country so desperately needs, they will not come at the expense of the natural environment or rural communities. We are maintaining the existing strong protections in the national planning policy framework for the best and most versatile agricultural land—the land most important for food production—and we have preserved protections for high-quality green-belt land and land safeguarded for environmental reasons, such as national landscapes. Alongside those protections, we are ensuring that green-belt developments deliver more accessible green space and support nature recovery.

As the right hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay knows, to support the Government’s plan-for-change milestone of building 1.5 million new homes this Parliament, we introduced a new standard method for assessing local housing need. We recognise that as a result, some areas of the country will see their targets raised. That includes London and the south-east; the numbers we consulted on back in July were raised partly in response to concerns expressed through the consultation about the lack of responsiveness to affordability. Many areas will see their targets raised, and on 12 December, we raised London’s target from the number we had consulted on. However, the acute and entrenched nature of the housing crisis in England demands that we take steps to significantly increase the supply of homes of all tenures, and all parts of the country, including Basildon and Billericay, need to play their part.

Will the Minister reflect on the concerns I have raised, and that have been raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) in previous debates, about the huge changes we face locally with devolution? Who will be accountable for local plans when the council that is ramming them through will not even exist in the near future? There is real concern that this is like a hit job being done on our local communities.

I recognise the right hon. Gentleman’s point. That will depend, of course, on the state of the local plan and what point it is at—whether it is at regulation 18 or 19—and where it is moving forward, but I recognise the point about interaction of the local plan development process with the proposals set out in the English devolution White Paper. There is also a related concern, which I have spoken to the right hon. Gentleman about on a previous occasion: the Government are very clear that we want to see universal coverage of strategic planning across the country, and we will be asking sub-regions across the country to come together to produce spatial development strategies. That may address concerns in his part of the country and others by ensuring that they consider whether cross-border co-operation might ensure that housing growth happens in a planned and more sensible way, rather than every local authority attempting to meet its need within its own confines.

The right hon. Gentleman will know that this Government inherited what I consider to be a frankly appalling situation in which less than a third of local planning authorities have an up-to-date local development plan. That is not a sustainable basis for a plan-led system, and that is why we have set out an expectation that every local planning authority must have a local plan. I appreciate that the right hon. Gentleman’s involvement in the affairs of Basildon council is a relatively recent development, but he will know that some of the pressures of unplanned development that the authority is experiencing will be because the current local plan was adopted in 1998, making the authority one of a very small number without a Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 plan in place. That reinforces the point that getting a local plan in place is the most effective protection against speculative development. Where plans are not up to date, or where local planning authorities are not delivering the homes that their communities need, it is right that development can come forward from outside the plan, but we want to see more plan-led development across the country.