The Tories today warned about Labour’s threat to the green belt as it was revealed the party are preparing to swifly order councils to think again about protected land.
Sir Keir Starmer vowed to ‘hit the ground running’ and turbocharge housebuilding from ‘day one’ of taking office after pledging to build 1.5million new homes.
In a joint newspaper interview with shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves, he promised Labour would be building more than 300,000 homes a year within five years.
But Ms Reeves sparked concerns as she explained how Labour would pursue what she has previously called a ‘common sense’ approach to building on green belt land.
She told the Sunday Times: ‘Just because something’s designated ‘green belt’ does not mean it’s green.’
The newspaper reported that, by the third week of a Labour government, incoming housing secretary Angela Rayner will have written to local councils.
The party’s deputy leader will order them to start a process of ‘regularly reviewing’ their green belt boundaries to ensure they are hitting housing targets, it said.
The intention will be that councils will identify areas to be reclassified for development.
Oliver Dowden, the Deputy Prime Minister, seized on the report as he urged previous Conservatives voters not to abandon the party on Thursday.
He told Sky News: ‘I have many conversations with voters whose pen is sort of proverbially hovering over which box to put the cross in.
‘If you’re worried – and so many voters I speak to are genuinely worried about what Labour will do to their taxes, whether they’re a pensioner or a first time buyer.
‘They’re worried about what Labour will do to the green belt.
‘The only way, if you share our Conservative values of cutting taxes, of controlling migration, it’s only by voting Conservative that you can stop Labour getting in.’
There are around 6,300 square miles of green belt land in England, which is designed to prevent urban sprawl into the countryside.
In the Sunday Times interview, Ms Reeves said there was an ‘urgency’ for Labour to become the party of housebuilders because ‘we know that for kids like us today [from working-class backgrounds], some of those opportunities [to own a home] don’t exist’.
Research by Searchland, a specialist development site sourcing company, has found reclassifying just 1 per cent of the green belt in England could produce as many as 738,000 new homes.
Ms Reeves added: ‘We all know that there is building on greenfield [sites] today, but it’s chaotic.
‘We also know there are different types of green belt land. Just because something’s designated ‘green belt’ does not mean it’s green.’
According to the newspaper, under Labour’s plans for government, the council-led review of green belt land to be reclassified for development will be announced by the end of July.
Local authorities will have to release green belt land if brownfield sites are insufficient, it reported.
A recruitment drive for 300 more planning officers, to speed up the rate at which permissions are granted for developments, will also be unveiled.
At the end of July, Labour will publish a draft of the national planning policy framework.
It will restore top-down targets to ensure councils are meeting housing needs in their areas.
Earlier this month, Sir Keir was forced to deny Labour plans to ‘flatten the whole green belt’ to build houses if the party wins the election n 4 July.
The Labour leader insisted he would ‘protect the countryside’ if he enters Downing Street, while also meeting his party’s pledge to build 1.5million new homes within five years.
He was forced to respond after Rishi Sunak claimed to have exposed Labour’s ‘real views on Britain’s green belt’.
The PM highlighted an article from the Politico website, which quoted a Labour official as saying: ‘I don’t care if we flatten the whold green belt, we just need more houses in this country.’
Posting on X, formerly known as Twitter , Mr Sunak wrote: ‘Just been sent this article from Politico this morning. Good to finally get Labour’s real views on Britain’s green belt.’
But, during a visit to a housing development in York, Sir Keir told journalists: ‘No, that wasn’t Labour Party officials. That wasn’t Labour Party policy.
‘What we will do is we will build the one and a half million houses that we need over the next five years on projects like this, with the facilities they need.
‘Because what you need here is the schools and the GPs and the facilities that are needed for housing.
‘We will get on and do the building we need to do, but we’d of course protect the countryside, as you’d expect.’