Housing White Paper

Lord Rooker Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rooker (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm that the last Labour Government left 19,000 more hectares of green belt than they inherited and that the one thing we are not short of in this country is land? In England, the last time I checked, 15% of land is made up of areas of outstanding natural beauty—no one is talking about building on that—9% is made up of national parks, and no one is talking about building on that; while only 9% is actually built on, and 13% is green belt, most of which is rubbish land—collars around urban areas—which can be swapped. It can be built on because the infrastructure is there. This is nonsense—no one is talking about building over the countryside. Forty-six per cent of that, added to what I have just said, leaves 54% of land which is farmland and unprotected land. One thing that we are not short of is land—and the public sector, last time I checked, owns enough land to build 2 million homes. We keep being told about this but nobody is using it.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord about 13% of land in England being green belt. That is absolutely right; that figure has been constant for some years and we are determined that it should remain at 13%. I do not agree with the noble Lord about his classification of green belt land; it is absolutely vital that we maintain the green belt. But I do join him in saying that there is plenty of land that can be built on; 87% of land is not green belt, on that calculation, and there is much that we can do in relation to building on brownfield land and in relation to land that the Government hold—and, as I indicated in the Statement, that we are releasing, because the Government, along with everybody else, should not be land banking. It is important that we do that, and it is also important that local authorities that have difficulty identifying land in their own area should discuss the issue with their neighbouring authorities to see whether they can do something together. All those things are highlighted in the White Paper.