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Mr. Caborn: I hope to clear that point up later in my speech.
Finally, local authorities meet at regional planning conferences and, using the household projections as their starting point, try to assess how the growth patterns in their region can best be managed. We will examine that issue carefully in the next year, and we will consult about how to strengthen regional planning. We are committed to the plan-led system, although we believe that it needs modernising. Regional areas need strengthening, as the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) suggested when he mentioned economic development in the regions.
Mr. Dawson:
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government were bequeathed a centralised planning system, in which local people had little opportunity to participate in the fundamental decision making at regional and county structure level? As part of his welcome proposals for reviewing regional planning operations and the possible introduction of regional development agencies, will he consider ways in which local people can have the first instead of the last say in the crucial housing needs and the environmental capacity of the areas that they know so well?
Mr. Caborn:
That is an excellent intervention, and we will consider those issues when we consult on the modernisation of the plan-led system. [Interruption.] I say that genuinely, although the hon. Member for Christchurch is sniggering. The Conservatives never offered the people proper consultation. During their 18 years in office, people had to take it or leave it. We do not behave like that. We genuinely consult people and take their point of view into account. I may also say that I will probably take up the offer by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud, and launch the consultation on the plan-led system in his constituency.
Mr. Chope:
Will the Minister accept that every planning policy guidance note was subject to the most thorough consultation process before it was implemented?
Mr. Caborn:
My comments about consultation were in a wider context. The plan-led system exists, and planning guidance will continue to be subjected to consultation among those whom it will affect.
The regional planning conferences decide how much new growth their urban areas can take and broadly how much should go on brown-field sites and how much on green-field sites. If the Secretary of State is happy with their decisions, the advice is formally turned into regional planning guidance by the Government office. Following that, counties and local authorities use the regional planning guidance as the basis for preparing their plans.
At each stage, the projections are again tested and distributed by the authorities. So where all the housing goes eventually--green-field or brown-field sites--is decided by the local authorities. It must be stressed that that is where the decision is taken.
It is unfortunate that the debate still seems to be stuck on the question whether we believe the projections, or whether we need to meet demand. That ground has been examined in detail on numerous occasions, especially in the previous Administration's Green Paper "Household Growth--Where shall we live?", which has been mentioned already today. That document stated in no uncertain terms that large-scale household growth was a fact driven by social, demographic, and cultural changes and that we should address how we can manage the problems, or grasp the opportunities that the growth presents, rather than focusing on "not in my back yard" attitudes.
Mrs. Organ:
I understand the principle of using the projection model, but I am concerned about the lack of academic investigation of the social drivers. Where does what is happening in society come into the numbers and the model?
Mr. Caborn:
That is factored in in a number of ways. I cannot go into the detail now, but it is in the household projections to the year 2016.
I was about to say that, since the 1920s, every projection for household growth has been an underestimate. Moreover, in 1995 the Environment Committee's inquiry into housing need went through the entire methodology of the way in which such figures are arrived at. It is not for me, from the Dispatch Box, to direct, but all I can suggest is that, if Select Committees wishes to revisit that methodology and the rest of what the Select Committee did in 1995, it is open to it to do so.
Mr. Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury)
rose--
Mr. Caborn:
I cannot give way again. Time is moving on.
Many people still criticise the system, but no one produces viable alternatives. With all due respect, it was a bit of a back-of-the-fag packet calculation by which the figure was brought down this morning from 4.4 million to half a million.
Those who suggest that local authorities should not make adequate provision for projected housing demand often seem to ignore the consequences. People must realise that serious under-provision would mean house price inflation, as demand bids up prices--and the average price of residential development land in England is already £250,000 per acre.
That would mean an increase in the Government's social housing bill, because more people would be unable to afford their own homes, and because land prices would continue to rise. It would even mean an increase in homelessness as some people were forced out of the system altogether, and, with fewer homes to go round, an increase in sharing would become a reality, so many people could be forced into living together against their wishes. Those factors must be considered.
I should make clear the fact that the target for reusing previously developed land remains at 50 per cent., the same as the previous Government's official target. Although the Green Paper floated a figure of 60 per cent. as an aspirational target, and the UK Round Table on Sustainable Development even suggested 75 per cent., we have not changed the target. The key issue, however, is that, whatever recycling target is proposed, by whatever Government, a certain proportion of growth will still need to take place on green-field sites.
Mr. Clappison:
Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Caborn:
For the last time.
Mr. Clappison:
Am I to take it that the Minister is not listening to the UK Round Table on Sustainable Development, and is ignoring the consultation and the figure that it gave? He will know that the target of 50 per cent. is only slightly higher than the 47 per cent. that was achieved in 1992. Will he think carefully about giving a lead for urban regeneration and brown-field development by setting a target?
Mr. Caborn:
I can set targets, but if targets are not realistic, it is stupid for Governments to set them. I have set a target of 50 per cent. and if we can achieve that, and more, I should welcome the fact. If we could get 100 per cent. of development on brown-field sites, I would welcome that--but all the evidence from the previous Administration, as well as our present advice, suggests that it is not achievable.
What I have said so far is very general. What does it mean for local areas, for local people in Stroud and the rest of Gloucestershire? As my hon. Friend will know from his time as a Stroud district councillor, Gloucestershire county council is reviewing its structure plan. In that process, it has to take as its starting point the housing requirement figure agreed and published in the regional planning guidance for the south-west. That figure is 53,000 additional dwellings between 1991 and 2011. It was based on the previous set of household projections, not those issued in 1995, which provide the basis for the 4.4 million additional households.
The consultation draft Gloucestershire structure plan was published in May 1996. It accepted the regional planning guidance figure of 53,000, and allocated 8,900 additional dwellings to Stroud for the period 1991 to 2011.
Mr. Caborn:
No, I cannot give way, because if I do I shall not be able to get through my speech, and hon. Members have already asked me to answer some of the questions.
Mr. Chope:
Will the Minister get to the green belt?
Mr. Caborn:
I shall deal with that, too.
Following its consideration of the responses to the draft plan, Gloucestershire county council does not intend to proceed further with it. I understand that it is now in the process of preparing a new plan, which it intends to place on deposit for public consultation on 12 January. That
plan will be subject to scrutiny at an examination in public, which the council intends to hold next June. That will give everyone concerned about its content an opportunity to question the county's proposals.
Stroud district published a local plan consultation document last July, which accepted the housing requirements in the draft structure plan. After taking account of houses built since 1991, existing allocations and an allowance for windfall sites, the council identifies a need to find land for a further 3,800 new dwellings between now and 2011.
The consultation draft considers ways in which the requirement could be met, and identifies 12 potential housing sites. I understand that the largest of those, covering about 200 acres in an area of outstanding natural beauty to the north of Stroud, in the Painswick valley, has been very controversial locally. My officials in the Government office for the south-west have commented that the consultation paper did not consider how the proposed development in the Painswick valley could be reconciled with the objectives of designating areas of outstanding natural beauty; nor did it provide any local justification that might override the national importance of the designation.
I understand that the district council intends to publish a deposit version of the plan next summer, so my hon. Friend and his constituents will have a further opportunity to make their views known. The district council will have an opportunity to reconsider its proposals, and if it does not, objectors have the right to debate the issue before an inspector at the local plan inquiry. That is a good illustration of the process of checks and balances.
The household projections feed into the consideration of housing requirements in regional planning guidance, which, after debate at the regional level, allocates housing requirement figures to the counties. The counties then propose how much housing should be provided for in their areas by district, and that is tested at the examination in public into the structure plans. The structure plan figures are then further tested in the course of producing the district-wide local plans through public consultation, and ultimately at the local plan inquiry. That also shows that it is for local authorities to determine how and where new housing should go.
The new housing creates both problems and opportunities. District councils cannot simply decide which field should be developed next, or what sites can be found for redevelopment. The need to look ahead to 2011 ensures that they must address the question of what
will prove the most suitable and sustainable pattern of development. The choices must be local, unless there is direct conflict with national policy. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud would agree that is how things should be.
I now come to the question that the shadow spokesman, the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) asked about urbanisation. The urbanisation projections should be put into perspective. The most recent projections suggest that the additional housing from 1991 to 2016 would mean only about an extra 1.3 per cent. of the whole of England being urbanised by 2016, bringing urbanisation to a total of 11.9 per cent. It is on that 11.9 per cent. that 88 per cent. of the population would live. That hardly sounds like the concreting over of the countryside that some Members would have us believe is taking place. There would still be as much green belt as urban land.
There is growing concern about the green belt, but let me put that into perspective. The green belt has doubled in area over the past 20 years, whereas the amount of land in urban use has increased by just over 10 per cent. in the same period.
Four times as much land has been added to the green belt over the past 20 years as we expect to urbanise over the next 20 years. The policy on green belts, however, has not changed. It is in PPG2: there is a presumption against inappropriate development in green belts. However, local authorities have always been able to make changes to the boundaries of green belts through the development plan process. That allows for public participation. If local people consider that the most suitable approach, we must think carefully before intervening.
Overall, we have very tight controls on development in this country, with 35 per cent. of our land area designated, as areas of outstanding natural beauty, national parks, sites of special scientific interest or other special protection areas. In addition, more than 15 per cent. of land is protected as high-grade agricultural land. The countryside, we believe, is not unprotected.
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