Labour plans to plow over green belt

[brujarosada]

I despise the Tories.

I can't possibly vote for a party that would affirmatively plan to destroy designated green space.

What to do?

Correct. This also provides zero comfort.

I didn't say that tradespeople were excluded! Somebody else did. FWIW I wouldn't use a sexist term like tradesman either.

Private golf clubs are full of people with money, is that any better?

@brujarosada More information -

"Sir Keir used the example of houses being built on a playing field in Maidstone rather than on a car park, with the reason given that the car park was classified as being in the green belt." Evening Standard

Sir Keir, speaking to Times Radio, said developers and landowners were holding on to real estate as they “try to ensure that it gains as much value as possible”.
He added: “Developers and landowners actually have a vested interest in not building so many houses, because that keeps the price high."

For your information I used both terms tradesmen and tradespeople in my posts, but clearly reading is not your strong point, so quit with the sexist crap. Not one person has mentioned on this thread that trades people are excluded, only you have made the claim that no golf clubs in Surrey have trades as members, it’s there as clear as day in your posts, but you keep denying it if it makes you feel better.

Meanwhile the atrocities of the Tories during g Covid continue to absolutely sicken me. No comparison.

We need to build a huge amount of housing. We’re getting to a crisis point.

The green belt can cause issues. People end up being pushed out of the city increasing commutes, traffic and the associated pollution. Oxford os a great example of this. We need more housing in our cities which is the most sustainable way for people to live.

The problem is they always build new on top of old because it's cheaper . It would be far better not to concrete over the whole of the south east , parts are at saturation point now , and build north , new towns , incentivise companies to move in creating jobs . New infrastructure.

If you generally make your political decisions based on headlines then by all means let perfect be the enemy of good. However if you'd like your vote to make a difference it is worth considering that "green belt" is a formal Planning term with very specific legal meaning and often does not line up with the sort of green space it's nice to have on your doorstep. If this is something you feel strongly about you might want to read some Planning decisions where you live (they will be on your council's website) or even go along to watch your local council's Planning panel in action - it's eye opening to see how policy translates into real life.

A huge number of people are living in intolerable damp, overcrowded dumps because we have a severe housing shortage in the places where there are jobs. Something has to change, and attempts to move jobs Up North won't work at the scale that's needed in the near future - so more houses are needed.

There are currently too many demands on our land, greenbelt or otherwise. We need more housing. We need more farmland. We need land for wind farms, and solar farms. We need more land for reservoirs. For every housing estate or new town, you will need these, and schools, and doctors, and shops. You do also need land for leisure, for all the stressed people shoved into small living spaces.

What is the limit, which is more important. Each will rely on the others being available.

I wish people like the OP would say what the solution is to the housing crisis. People are living around a decade longer than 40 years ago, meaning that fewer houses are available for young families. Assuming that no one thinks the elderly should be made to downsize, then we need more homes built.

I'm not interested in what the UK looks like from a flippin airplane! What matters is the actual experience of real people on the ground. I'm in rural Essex and it's now so crowded I could scream. My local woods have been hacked down to build a new estate, and a second giant estate is going up at the other end of the village that, frankly, is more like a new town. The traffic is so awful I barely go out. And in the summer, instead of birdsong all you can hear is the screeching and exploding of boy racer cars.

The left always treat people like statistics. Statistically you could fit the world's entire population on the Isle of Wight, if we all stood shoulder to shoulder and no one breathed. But would you want to live on the Isle of Wight? No doubt some left-wing lunatics would, because they will put up with ANYTHING rather than control immigration. And that's the key. Labour are effectively saying "look, we're not going to clamp down on immigration. You know it, and we know it. Immigration will increase under a centre-left government, and you're just going to have to get used to it. The British countryside, especially in the midlands and the south, has got to go."

Last year, net migration was 600,000. That's the population of Manchester. But the migration crisis hasn't even started yet. Africa has the highest birth rate in the world. In fact, their birth rate is so high the African population is going to double by 2050. On top of that, lifespan is increasing, which means people aren't dying and making room. More and more people, more and more houses, more and more noise, less and less space...that's the future.

A lot of left-wing people secretly love to imagine lives being ruined by Labour's building plans. They pose as morally superior, but they are every bit as hate-filled as the right. Still, their hatred is directed towards middle-class NIMBYs, so that's OK.

But there are so many brownfield sites and unused office blocks.
Once the left chop down every tree, build over every green field and poison every last wildflower, who will pollinate your crops?
Without insects we cannot survive.
Does wildlife and nature mean so little to you.

Sorry to burst your classist bubble but all the golf fanatics I know are retired builders.
Golf courses are rubbish for the environment as they use toxic weed killers.
Destroy nature at your peril.
Plenty of unused office blocks that could be turned into homes.

'The words of the speech don't actually say much of anything. I'm not comforted by them.'

But you didn't reference them either did you?
Just went with the most dramatic interpretation & dropped it into a thread title!

Excuse me for being cynical of your motives!

There are so many of these sort of threads around at the moment - anyone would think the Tories are worried about losing the next election! 🙄

I’d love to live on the Isle of Wight

I’ll have this one

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/140634698#/?channel=RES_BUY

Green belt designation is strategic, it's about stopping separate towns merging into one. Personally I think it is an out of date idea and it would be fine for some towns to merge more. The remaining areas should then be enhanced to provide wildlife-rich green recreational space on the urban fringe for the larger population.

@JaneyGee All the things that have happened in housing development and immigration during the last 13 years has happened under a Tory government, yet all your anger is directed at the left.

Woah, where did you get the impression nature meant so little to me? I said I would be voting Labour with some reservations. Should I be voting Tory?

But the Tories are also destroying green belt land, it's not a labour policy but we all recognise that we need more houses.

The big issue that needs to be tackled is buy to let and second homes. Many places with acute housing shortages are areas where second homes have been an issue or where rentals have grown. So it's pointless building more if they end up in the wrong hands. 170 homes were built near me and before they were even finished every house was in the hands of a large buy to let landlord.... charging 900 quid a month for a one bedroom apartment and over a 1000 for a small house.

This is all boils down to years of poor policy and dogged free market philosophy. Something needs to change drastically because I don't think you can build your way out of a housing crisis. Unfortunately it needs regulations and that's something this government doesn't do.

We tend to build 2 storeys high in the UK, or 32. We could, in the right places, build 4 storeys high. That would take up a little less land. I know the 32s have been blown up now, because they were too high, but it was a phase we went through some years ago.

I wish there would be more regulation about how many houses can be plonked tightly on to any given space. A local developer has been allowed to put expensive houses on to a small field, having taken down a row of thin trees, and he has given them tiny lawns and massive areas for 6 or so vehicles to park, all arid stones. There's hardly room for a green blade. He's also given them those sodding outside lights that are like little cylinders, for neurotic prats to think how nice it is to light everything up and not be frightened of the dark, and completely destroy the British countryside thereby. One day I am going to run amok and smash them all and get sent to prison for it.

So why not plough up the golf courses, which as pps said take up far too much room in an overpopulated country, for very few people, and for generally well-off people to boot? Plus are bad for the environment? Rather than eating up more farmland which provides amenity and something fairly essential for the lives of those overpopulated millions.

I’m a town planner and live in an area that is 50% green belt. It’s not all fields, parks and bridleways.
I personally think we should have some qualitative measure of “greenness” which would free up at least 5 large sites I can think of that are, as previous poster said, car parks and hardstandings.
the policy at the moment is, yes, development of previously developed land is an exception to inappropriate development but there is the caveat that the new development shall not have a greater impact on openness than the existing situation.
With ground level PDL it is almost inevitable that any development will have a greater impact on openness. So no development. When actually a sensible approach would be to consider pragmatically what that space offers in relation to the purposes of green belt designation.
Part of the problem also is that de designation through local plan process hardly ever happens. And plans run in a cycle of years. So actually having clearer and sensible central government guidance (and more money in local authority planning, so extra cash would be helpful from the government too) might make the system more realistic and dynamic.

Of course there should also be the capacity to require that landowners don’t deliberately degrade sites.

I think it's important to remember that a lot of green belt isn't actually... green. A lot of it has development on it already.

That said, I'd strongly prefer building on brownfields, and on the "golf belt" (golf courses may look green but they really, really aren't. And they currently take up almost as much space as housing in the UK!). And I'd also like to see more densification of existing suburbs (putting low-rise flats in place of bungalows, adding extra stories to existing buildings, perhaps putting some extra buildings in places of garages). I would also like to avoid unnecessary urban sprawl. I see these horrid new-build housing estates on the edge of town and they seem so badly located and so lacking in services and in nice, sociable shared spaces.

It's important that people understand that there are trade-offs about building on brownfield and already-developed sites.

When we densify existing suburbs, we get moans about "dust/noise of construction" and "pressure on GPs/schools/whatever" (even though most schools have falling rolls these days). Infrastructure does catch up eventually (because new residents are not just consumers of services... they also work in, staff and pay taxes towards GP services and the like), but in the meantime there can be time lags and people have simply got to be patient about this. People also panic about "where will all the cars go?" and it may be essential to tighten up parking laws and for the area to shift more towards public transport and other modes of transport, to ensure that extra residents don't cause the whole area to become horribly congested.

And building on brownfield sites brings conflicts of its own. A lot of residents of suburbia and the countryside are all in favor of "Build on brownfield!" because they basically think this is a way of "putting those annoying people in a bin where I don't have to see them, while I get to hog all this lovely space and greenery for myself." They often suddenly become a lot less keen when the penny starts to drop and they begin to realize that "brownfield" tends to mean "car parks" most of the time, and that their ability to drive into town and park is going to start disappearing (this is starting to happen in places like Leeds, apparently). Also, if the UK shifts towards a more Continental/Japanese model where urban centers are full of apartments and people living there, those residents will want more walkable and bikeable centers and will start to push back against the suburban denizens who are used to being able to drive their SUVs in.

If we want to be stricter about avoiding green belt, it would also help if the British could try and get a bit more used to the idea of apartments (not for everyone, but perhaps for more people? More families?), and sharing a shared garden or local park, rather than insisting on detached homes with gardens for everyone. I live this way, and it can be a great way to raise a family if you have decent lifts, soundproofing and balconies. That demands a bit of a culture shift and also learning from other cultures that make apartment living "work."

The only other alterative is "tall skinny houses with many floors." I know some people here in Tokyo who have these; they are nice in some ways and it can be nice to have your own plot of land, but oh my goodness, people do get awfully sick of the millions of stairs! And you can't have a proper balcony.

Trade-offs, innit?

Just to add to the above: densifying existing places (and thereby avoiding building on meadows) also requires a bit of flexibility about changing, altering and sometimes pulling down and replacing buildings. You can get a very long way by adding extra floors to a regular detached house and dividing it into two semis, or replacing a bungalow (they tend to have big plots) with a 4-5 storey mini block of apartments or maisonettes, and so on.

Having architectural links with history can be nice and all, but I do think the British go a bit far with the determination to cling on to every unexciting 1930s semi or bungalow. Some of these structures need to be replaced. Perhaps offering more traditional styled architecture along the Poundbury style of esthetics would help? Some people are snobbish about this, but I think it helps to offer stuff that is pretty and is what people are used to.

I'd like to see apartments/maisonnettes with two good elevators and nice shared gardens to become the norm for more elderly couples rather than bungalows; bungalows are ridiculously space-inefficient and encourage sprawl, yet without more access to single-storey stairless living, it's going to continue to be very hard to get older people to downsize from bigger family-sized homes.

Anyway, just some thoughts if we want to try and deal with the current crisis without paving over every meadow.