Housing White Paper

Peter Dowd Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

It would be inappropriate for me to discuss a particular planning application, but I can confirm that protections for green belt are as strong as ever. In fact, the White Paper sets out for the first time much more clearly the steps that we expect a local authority to take before it even considers the green belt, including having to show that it has looked at all reasonable alternatives.

[Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)]

How does the Secretary of State intend to help local authorities purchase land under compulsory purchase orders when he has devastated their budgets by up to 60%? He should be holding himself to account for his failures, not local authorities.

[Sajid Javid]

We are specifically consulting on the possibility of local authorities holding auctions using a compulsory purchase order, so they would not necessarily be buying land themselves.