thorncliffeys

The Economist newspaper often likes to shock by making bold proposals that assail shibboleths of British life. This week its marmalade-dropper was a radical suggestion on housing development: “To protect pristine land and unleash the economy, scrap the green belt”.

As mops hit home counties kitchen floors, the leader argued giving up just 10% of the green belt could give land for 5m new homes, in planned new towns. The green belt kept house prices high, but very little of it is actually open to the public. Yet polling shows it remains very popular. So could there be change?

November next year sees the centenary of the London County Council carrying a motion asking its Town Planning Committee to look into preserving a “green belt” around Greater London, by which they meant a half mile radius of undeveloped land. That didn’t happen, but extensive development in the 1930s pushed the LCC in 1938 to get an Act of Parliament allowing them to buy land around London to save it.

But the planning green belt was different – a post-war attempt to make sure development kept within the city. The misdirection succeeded, but so did the policy: the edge of London remains basically where it was in 1939. Meanwhile the green belt has expanded – leading to ‘leapfrog’ building just over the end of its boundaries.

21^st century pressure for homes has already seen the green belt come under strain. Councils with most of their land area under green belt restrictions complained their housing targets took no account of it, and many hit political controversy over their local plan: it’s one reason many previously safe Conservative councils have changed party control.

Although party outriders sometimes complain (a 2015 Adam Smith Institute report calling for abolition was called ‘the Green noose’), Conservative governments have consistently cleaved to defend the green belt. The 2020 Planning white paper was adamant.

Liz Truss, who called for building a million homes on the green belt in her 2019 leadership campaign, had partly rowed back by 2022; her Levelling Up Secretary Simon Clarke was interested in relaxing the policy, but never had the opportunity and we are now back to plan A: Michael Gove’s recent speech was all about inner-city densification – not, as Rishi Sunak put it, “concreting over the countryside”.

Recent movement has instead come from the other side of the aisle and in light of Labour’s ming vase caution, its willingness to say potentially controversial things about the green belt may be meaningful. Keir Starmer did not say the words “green belt” to the British Chambers of Commerce but in interviews voluntarily mentioned developments blocked on car parks in the green belt.

Details of what a Labour government will do are not yet clear, and Starmer has also given an interview to local newspapers in Greater Manchester reassuring them “I want to protect the Green Belt and our countryside”, but “We build on the Green Belt at the moment but we need to build on those bits which aren’t particularly pleasurable.”

Labour is clearly happy to have a general election fight on the green belt, but the Conservatives may find a surprising ally in their corner – Mayor Sadiq Khan has always committed to protecting the green belt and opposing any relaxation of policy. For all that Sunak and Gove attack his record, Khan is with them in wanting a lot of homes built in inner London and the ‘second Docklands’ and not in extending London into surrounding districts.

Details of Labour’s policy haven’t been published and are likely to be light before the election, but it’s possible next year’s centenary of the green belt concept may see the first moves to roll it back.

SME developers have been in the news for their campaign to change the government’s approach to housing, planning, regulations, taxation, as well as supply change issues driving up costs.  We know that SME developers provide diversity in design and offer, boost housebuilding numbers, are often regionally based and provide an active role in local communities.  An active SME developer market would also lessen the accusation of landbanking and oligarchic behaviour of the big housebuilders.    

Securing planning permission is the major risk factor, but so is the availability of land and finance, LPA staff shortages, energy and material costs, and even the ‘nutrients’ issue in many areas. 

If you’re a SME developer, we have a cost effective consultation package for you. 

We can talk to you about communityUK, which is an online consultation platform and the best way to engage with local communities for planning or infrastructure projects.

https://www.communityuk.live/

We have a great record of helping secure letters of support. With our Yes to Homes platform, we can guarantee a specified number of supportive letters, each with supportive individual comments.

https://yesto.homes

We can work with you to ensure the planning committee is supportive.

For more information, email richard.patient@thorncliffe.com

Politicians love to denounce developers for concreting over green space with soulless new blocks, while progressive voices hate gentrification driving out the poor for luxury flats. Election candidates seek votes to stop developers “running amok” and “riding roughshod” over locals, and Ministers relieve councils from having to meet ‘Stalinist’ housebuilding targets.

But it seems people actually quite like housebuilding, even when it’s near them.

Pollsters Redfield and Wilton Strategies surveyed 1,100 eligible voters in London from 10-12 June, and weighted the respondents to match the population. Alongside voting intention for next year’s Mayoral election they added some questions suggested by independent website OnLondon to look at underlying attitudes.

When asked, a full 63% supported “an increase in house and apartment building in London”. Although support was strongest from working age respondents, even those over 65 were clearly supportive (57%, with 23% opposed). Differences between inner and outer London were not great.

Just in case of NIMBYism, the poll question was tweaked to ask about increasing housebuilding “in your area”. The change meant support dropped – but only to 58%. This five point change was broadly mirrored across all groups.

Two other findings from the poll are worth mentioning. Women are ten percentage points more opposed to building houses than are men (22% against 12%, rising to 28% against 18% when it’s building ‘in your area’). Second, when Londoners were asked who had most power over housing in London, there was an even split between those picking the Prime Minister and those saying it was the Mayor.

OnLondon’s creator Dave Hill has written many times criticising “simplistic and misleading populism” narratives of gentrification and social cleansing. Freelance writer and former New Statesman assistant Jonn Elledge is known for his YIMBY stance of “build more bloody houses”.

From the centre-right, Robert Colvile of the Centre for Policy Studies and CapX regularly argues in the Sunday Times that a massive increase in housebuilding is not merely popular, but is essential for the future of Conservatism.

The public want more houses, and know perfectly well that can’t be done without individual schemes being allowed. People are not stupid; give more of them the right to speak and developers are likely to get a nice surprise.

Links:

Poll findings: https://redfieldandwiltonstrategies.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/OnLondon-10-12.06.2023.xlsx

Dave Hill on ‘gentrification’: https://www.onlondon.co.uk/brick-lane-anatomy-of-an-east-end-anti-gentrification-rage/

Jonn Elledge link: https://citymonitor.ai/uncategorized/skylines/podcast-build-more-bloody-houses-2945

Robert Colvile article: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/stuff-the-nimbys-and-build-build-build-the-future-of-britain-and-the-tories-depends-on-it-z5m5xns0f

It’s now 5pm on Friday, and we’re not even halfway to finding out exactly the full extent of the council results, but I think the general picture is clear – signs of voters aligning towards whichever party they think can remove Conservatives, especially where council administrations are unpopular. The Conservatives have lost most heavily in the wealthier and higher status areas, but also seen themselves squeezed in some ‘middle Britain’ areas in the midlands. Urban Staffordshire is a notable surprise – losing control of Tamworth, Labour gaining East Staffordshire.

In London and the South East Labour and Liberal Democrats are picking up most of the urban authorities, or moving them to no overall control. Where neither can win, the Green Party is picking up seats and taking the council to no overall control (spectacularly so in the case of East Hertfordshire). There are still some Conservative councils but they are further out and much more rural.

Development issues were much less prominent in this round of elections than four years ago. Instead it is financial mismanagement which seems to have cost council administrations (Labour losing Slough), and environmental issues (Plymouth Tories must rue the decision to chop down city centre trees). Cost of living issues seem to have driven things in Kent towards Labour.

While new administrations have not got a lot of anti-developer campaign pledges and some support high street renewal, the new political landscape will mean developers will have to take a much more sensitive approach to local communities and to think about how they will give the council a good story it can feed back to residents about the benefits of giving permission.

Labour’s national policy has moved more towards support for housebuilding recently, which may tempt the government (despite Michael Gove’s instincts) to allow councils more ability to restrict development in the hope that opposition to housebuilding becomes a useful electoral weapon for the Conservatives.

Local elections are coming up in lots of district and unitary councils around the home counties, a few metropolitan councils (mainly in the north) and 4 mayoral elections including Bedford.

Unitary councils like Brighton, Bournemouth, Central Beds, Luton, Peterborough, Wokingham, Windsor, MK, Reading and Southampton will be joining a mass of district councils – from Elmbridge, Colchester, Ipswich, Sevenoaks, Uttlesford, Cambridge and the Vale of White Horse to hold elections in their areas. Whilst the Unitary councils tend to hold all-out elections, the districts can vary between full and thirds (electing a third every year over a four year cycle).

Elections take place on the first Thursday of May – so that’s 4th May.

There is one change this year that voters are going to have to get used to. Voter ID, which means you have to take your passport, driving licence, disabled or older person’s bus pass (!), or over 60 Oyster card. If you don’t fancy carrying your passport around with you, you can take an out-of-date passport, providing you still look similar to the photo.

We’ve got three resources for you.

1. Our localcouncils.co.uk map. Click here to open in a new tab, or see below.
2. A comprehensive list of the Mayors, Metropolitan Boroughs, Unitary Authorities and District Councils that are up for election (click here or see below the map).
3. Or give us a call on 020 7587 3047, or email hello@thorncliffe.com

Here’s the list of elections

Mayors: Bedford, Leicester, Mansfield, Middlesbrough

Metropolitan Boroughs: Barnsley, Bolton, Bradford, Bury, Calderdale, Coventry, Dudley, Gateshead, Kirklees, Knowsley, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle upon Tyne, North Tyneside, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Sandwell, Sefton, Sheffield, Solihull, South Tyneside, Stockport, Sunderland, Tameside, Trafford, Wakefield, Walsall, Wigan, Wirral, Wolverhampton

Unitary authorities: Bath and North East Somerset, Bedford, Blackburn with Darwen, Blackpool, Bournemouth Christchurch and Poole, Bracknell Forest, Brighton and Hove, Central Bedfordshire, Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Darlington, Derby, East Riding of Yorkshire, Halton, Hartlepool, Herefordshire, Kingston-upon-Hull, Leicester, Luton, Medway, Middlesbrough, Milton Keynes, North East Lincolnshire, North Lincolnshire, North Somerset, Nottingham, Peterborough, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Reading, Redcar and Cleveland, Rutland, Slough, South Gloucestershire, Southampton, Southend-on-Sea, Stockton-on-Tees, Stoke-on-Trent, Swindon, Telford and Wrekin, Thurrock, Torbay, West Berkshire, Windsor and Maidenhead, Wokingham, York

Lower-tier districts: Amber Valley, Arun, Ashfield, Ashford, Babergh, Basildon, Basingstoke and Deane, Bassetlaw, Blaby, Bolsover, Boston, Braintree, Breckland, Brentwood, Broadland, Bromsgrove, Broxbourne, Broxtowe, Burnley, Cambridge, Cannock Chase, Canterbury, Castle Point, Charnwood, Chelmsford, Cherwell, Chesterfield, Chichester, Chorley, Colchester, Cotswold, Crawley, Dacorum, Dartford, Derbyshire Dales, Dover, East Cambridgeshire, East Devon, East Hampshire, East Hertfordshire, East Lindsey, East Staffordshire, East Suffolk, Eastbourne, Eastleigh, Elmbridge, Epping Forest, Epsom and Ewell, Erewash, Exeter, Fenland, Folkestone and Hythe, Forest of Dean, Fylde, Gedling, Gravesham, Great Yarmouth, Guildford, Harborough, Harlow, Hart, Havant, Hertsmere, High Peak, Hinckley and Bosworth, Horsham, Hyndburn, Ipswich, King’s Lynn and West Norfolk, Lancaster, Lewes, Lichfield, Lincoln, Maidstone, Maldon, Malvern Hills, Mansfield, Melton, Mid Devon, Mid Suffolk, Mid Sussex, Mole Valley, New Forest, Newark and Sherwood, North Devon, North East Derbyshire, North Hertfordshire, North Kesteven, North Norfolk, North Warwickshire, North West Leicestershire, Norwich, Oadby and Wigston, Pendle, Preston, Redditch, Reigate and Banstead, Ribble Valley, Rochford, Rossendale, Rother, Rugby, Runnymede, Rushcliffe, Rushmoor, St Albans, Sevenoaks, South Derbyshire, South Hams, South Holland, South Kesteven, South Norfolk, South Oxfordshire, South Ribble, South Staffordshire, Spelthorne, Stafford, Staffordshire Moorlands, Stevenage, Stratford-on-Avon, Surrey Heath, Swale, Tamworth, Tandridge, Teignbridge, Tendring, Test Valley, Tewkesbury, Thanet, Three Rivers, Tonbridge and Malling, Torridge, Tunbridge Wells, Uttlesford, Vale of White Horse, Warwick, Watford, Waverley, Wealden, Welwyn Hatfield, West Devon, West Lancashire, West Lindsey, West Oxfordshire, West Suffolk, Winchester, Woking, Worcester, Worthing, Wychavon, Wyre, Wyre Forest