Developers met ministers dozens of times over planning bill while ecologists were shut out
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/nov/09/developers-met-ministers-dozens-of-times-over-planning-bill-while-ecologists-were-shut-out
Posted by insomnimax_99
8 Comments
>Exclusive: Leading ecologists say warnings over threat to wildlife have been ignored in drive to build 1.5m new homes
Good, homes need to be built.
Not held back by NIMBYs, ecologists, and nature organisations.
Government spoke to people who want to fix the problem instead of the people who make up anything and everything to halt all development. Go figure
Would they have tried to push for more of these bat shed structures that they seem to be in love with?
We need the natural ecology to be in working order for things a simple as drinking water, nevermind food, mental health and tourism.
Ignoring science so developers can get easier access to greenbelt land is not how we fix our housing issues. Most Cities have large amounts of unused land, in the form of abandoned department stores and disused industrial properties. Making it easier to rezone that empty land will provide space for thousands of new homes in just my city of Glasgow.
If you want to protect the environment from housebuilding then campaign to reduce immigration. Blocking housing being built but not the extra people arriving who need those homes just results in house prices forever rising, housing quality falling, and higher levels of poverty, welfare costs and deprivation as housing costs eat into everyone’s disposable income.
I don’t mean to by a cynic but the government knows we need to build new homes and it’s the developers and not the ecologists who are going to deliver that.
Of course, it is indispensable to consider ecology as part of these kinds of developments, but it is only one part of a much bigger picture.
Less than 10% of this country is built on. Around 40% is designated greenbelt, SSSI, AONB, national park or a combination of these designations. Ecologists have had decades of influence over Ministers, which is partly the reason we are where we are. I’m not surprised they were shut out because all they really want is no building anywhere ever.
Clearly, we need to simplify the rules, and get stuff built
But I’m still slightly concerned by this; we do need *some* checks and balances
How many more identikit housing estates will be building on flood plains?
I know of a development where they signed off the sewage plans despite them clearly indicating that all the water drainage will need to flow quite some way uphill.
And East West Rail, while a nice idea in concept, is an utterly bonkers design. More wiggly than an accordion, and approaching Cambridge from the wrong direction. The business case, in practice, just isn’t there – the Gov are well aware its a white elephant – but its being pushed forwards because it *sounds nice* as a political sales pitch (go biotech! Let’s not mention the fact all the US funding has dried up, and Cambridge is heading into a great big unemployment crisis)
The risk here is that in the rush to build anything, every plan just gets signed off regardless of quality
We need a sensible middle ground. Don’t let NIMBYs stop everything, but If locals will be hit financially then compensate them, and if they flag genuine concerns then ensure there are (sensible, time-constrained) processes to actually listen to them