'Terrible blow for people and nature' - Sussex countryside under threat amid new plan to solve housing crisis

In a decision which has been blasted as a ‘sick joke’ by one Conservative MP in Sussex, Prime Minister Keir Starmer has vowed to override ‘blockers’ standing in the way of building the new homes needed to solve the housing crisis – as reported in the national media on Thursday (December 12).

The Labour government’s publication of its revised National Planning Policy Framework has reduced the capital’s housebuilding target by 10,830 homes a year, and increased housing targets in the South East by 20,000.

With swathes of protected green space in Sussex – the county would be among those most affected.

Commenting on the National Planning Policy Framework, published on Thursday, the countryside charity CPRE chief executive Roger Mortlock said: “The broken housebuilding market is to blame for the painfully slow delivery of much-needed new homes. When big housebuilders deliberately limit the supply of new homes to maximise their profits, supercharging the current system will not lead to the change the government is looking for.

“The government’s plans risk a huge hike in the number of unaffordable, car-dependent homes. Building on England’s 1.2 million shovel-ready brownfield sites would do far more to unlock growth, regenerate communities and provide sustainable, genuinely affordable new homes.

“We welcome the commitment to local plans and affordable homes. However, local authorities responsible for delivering new homes will be swamped with speculative applications on high-quality Green Belt and farmland. Inevitably, many of these will be approved to meet nationally imposed targets.

“The ‘grey belt’ policy needs to be much more clearly defined and exclude working farms. It will undermine the Green Belt, one of this country’s most successful spatial protections with huge potential to help address the climate and nature emergencies.

“There's some hope ahead with plans for a strategy that covers all our use of land. Longer-term commitments to build genuinely affordable and better designed homes are welcome too. Until then, our countryside will remain needlessly under threat.”

Andrew Griffith, the Member of Parliament for Arundel and South Downs, has criticised the government’s decision to increase housing targets in the South East of England – whilst reducing them in London.

The Tory MP said: “These reforms to rig the planning system are a terrible blow for people and nature alike.

“West Sussex has taken far more than its fair share of housing development. To impose even higher targets from Whitehall when our infrastructure cannot cope is a sick joke.

“Remember the very first act of this government was to cancel improvements to reduce congestion on the A27.

“The homes the nation needs should be on brownfield sites which are well supplied with infrastructure such as 24/7 public transport, hospitals, universities and shops. We call these places ‘cities’ yet this disgraceful government has today confirmed lower targets for London.”

Jonathan Carr-West, chief executive of the Local Government Information Unit (LGIU), said planning is ‘only one part of this picture’.

He added: “House building has to be seen in the context of local economic development, skills provision and public service delivery.

“As leaders of place - councils are not just concerned with delivering houses but with building homes and communities.

“It’s right that the government has high expectations of councils, but they also need to provide them with the support that will enable them to rise to this challenge.”

The Open Spaces Society – the UK’s oldest national conservation body – fears for the future of open spaces in the government’s revised NPPF.

Kate Ashbrook, the society’s general secretary, said: “We called for legal protection and long-term maintenance of urban green space; standards for the amount of green space in development, and a duty on local authorities to ensure that everyone can enjoy good-quality, well-maintained and safe green space close to their homes.

"Green spaces are vital for the health and well-being of the nation. We believe the NPPF undervalues them.

“The Local Green Space designation is inadequate because the land only has the same protection as green belt and cannot be designated unless the neighbourhood or local plan is being prepared or updated.”

Ms Ashbrook said the society called for the process for identifying LGS to be improved, and its protection strengthened to ‘ensure it is not vulnerable to development’.

She added: “However, there is no change in the new NPPF – except that green belt is now even more vulnerable.

"While there are some warm words that planning policies should protect and enhance public rights of way and access, and existing open spaces should not be built on, the practice – with planning authorities under immense pressure – is likely to be different. We don’t see any hard policies and directives to ensure that our vital open spaces are protected and enhanced.

“Government appears to have given the cold shoulder to our proposal that, to increase the provision of permanent open space, developers should be mandated to provide such space and to register it as a town or village green. This would be a simple means of giving local people rights of recreation there and securing it for ever.”

The society’s general secretary said ‘we shall continue to lobby’ to ensure that green spaces are ‘at the heart of our planning system, for the benefit of all’.