New homes on Green Belt ‘not affordable for young people’

THE Government has been accused of “failing” young people and families after it emerged that hundreds of thousands of new homes proposed for development on Green Belt land will be built for the “top end of the market”.

Over 70 per cent of the 425,000 new homes expected to be built under regional planning policies will not be accessible to those struggling to get onto the housing ladder.

A report from the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) found that a number of local plans clearly state that the priority is “not to provide affordable housing, but large houses to service demand at the top end of the market”.

It suggested that the Government’s “new homes bonus” rewards the development of Green Belt land without providing much needed affordable housing. The CPRE estimates that the initiative, which incentivises local authorities to grant planning permission for new homes, will see councils pocket £2.4billion. Andrew Mitchell, the MP for Sutton Coldfield, told The

Daily Telegraph: “There is an incredible failure of imagination and paralysis of thinking in how we build the million more new homes our young people urgently require and are quite right to expect.

“Instead of despoiling our Green Belt, far more action on brown field land and new Garden Cities is required.

“There seems to be a lack of urgency in recognising that housing failure is one of the great inter-generational inequalities.”

Tom Fyans, director of campaigns and policy at CPRE, said: “We must not be the generation that sells off our precious Green Belt in the mistaken belief it will help improve the affordability of housing.

“The only ones set to benefit from future Green Belt development will be landowners and the big housebuilders, not communities in need of decent, affordable housing.”

A spokesman for the Department for Communities and Local Government said: “We do not recognise these figures. This Government is committed to protect the Green Belt. Only in exceptional circumstances may councils alter Green Belt boundaries.”