National Trust warns planning changes could tear up countryside
Members of the National Trust may be left thinking hard about whether their subs should be used for its criticism of new planning policy. Criticism of what many rural dwellers will see as long overdue changes to a previous approach to planning. An approach, which some could claim was based on a previously paternalistic and unrepresentative set of views, restricting the economic evolution of the countryside. Views given expression by the 1946 Planning Act which nationalised the right to develop land.
Luminaries as widely drawn as Sir Peter Hall and Lord Matthew Taylor have subsequently developed critiques of this approach. An approach which has made large areas of rural England impossible for people of ordinary means to live or work in. The 2010 OECD review of Rural England built on these critiques, reminding us that by world and even EU definitions none of England is rural. And in the process pointing out that attitudes to the countryside in England are therefore based on a pastoral idyll of ‘green space” in a densely populated island. Leading to policies which seek to preserve “green space” as a buffer against development between towns and cities, rather than seeking to understand their connectvities and hinterlands.
The current plannng system has led to policies which exclude people of ordinary means from living and working in some parts of the countryside. This needs to change, if our vision of sustainable development is to be achieved, not least beacuse there is a carbon imperative to reduce travel by creating more local employment. Achieving this will reduce the high carbon impact of previous policies which encouraged dense urban dwelling.
What we describe in this country as Rural England should not just be available for everyone to visit but also for people to chose to live and work in. Its time to let our national talent for compromise and common sense determine the nature of the countryside not a series of well intenentioned but inflexible codes and guidance. Codes and guidance which represent perhaps the last bastion of a now defunct post war approach which found expression in nationalisation. Anyway have a look at what the National Trust has to say and form your own view!!
“The 3.6 million-member organisation voiced “grave concerns” on Tuesday over government proposals to slash 1,000 pages of planning policy to just 52 pages in a move that has won the ringing endorsement of property developers.
Opponents claim the new draft policy effectively removes the national target for recycling brownfield land and allows local communities to support building on the green belt. It is set to be the biggest change to the planning system in more than 60 years and scraps detailed planning guidance notes and circulars. Instead, the government insists there should be a presumption in favour of “sustainable development” to house a rising population.The national planning policy framework (NPPF) is intended to speed up and simplify often complex laws at the same time as encouraging economic growth.”