Julian Glover's article about the "uglification of Britain" and the coalition government's desire "to break the stranglehold of a system that is bad at planning but good at shackling development" (Comment, 28 March) would have been greatly strengthened by reference to a recent report from the communities and local government select committee.
This warned the government that its plans to abolish regional spatial strategies (RSSs) will leave a vacuum at the centre of the English planning system that is likely to have profound social, economic and environmental consequences that could persist for decades.
The hiatus created in the planning system by the botched abolition of RSSs is giving rise to an inertia that is likely to hinder new housebuilding and will make it nigh on impossible to deliver facilities like mineral workings or sites for Gypsies.
We also found little evidence to suggest the new homes bonus will deliver affordable dwellings on the scale ministers predict. It is far more likely to encourage councils to build the wrong kinds of homes in the wrong areas – a finding broadly endorsed by new Town and Country Planning Association research.
With 4.5 million people in England in housing need, we need a new localised planning system that delivers the number of new, affordable homes we need. There must also be a consistent basis for needs assessment across local authorities.
Ministers need to bring forward appropriate transitional arrangements before RSSs are abolished. They must also ensure that there is an effective strategic planning framework capable of delivering a coherent and efficient system for local decision-making which allows the views of all stakeholders to be heard – individuals, developers, community and resident groups, businesses, local authorities, and central government.
Clive Betts MP
Chair, CLG select committee
• Julian Glover says the planning system is "broken" but does not really address the reasons why this may be so. It is easy for politicians to blame the regional spatial strategies for imposing unpopular housing targets. But it is demographics, not planning, that generates the need for housing. Replacing one planning system with another will not change this one iota; nor will it make people more receptive to housing in their backyard.
Historically, governments have addressed housing shortages by buying land. This makes more available for development and helps reduce its price. The coalition seems to think public assets should be disposed of during a recession when the price is low, losing the taxpayer money, while private landowners will continue to hoard their land if they cannot get the price they want.
Land values are created by the whole community, not by people who own fields on the edge of towns. There is no reason why landowners should become millionaires by selling the odd field, or why homebuyers and taxpayers should subsidise them while they do. Labour governments used to try to tackle such anomalies, for example through the Land Commission of 1967 or the Community Land Act of 1975. But Blair and Brown made no serious attempt at a land policy.
Philip Bisatt
Taunton, Somerset
• Julian Glover misses the point in encouraging the development of greenfield sites. Moving new development out of urban areas leads to dereliction, critically undermines quality of life and erodes the vitality of cities and the beauty of the countryside. It also increases the impact on climate change by failing to use existing facilities more effectively – eg public transport, schools, hospitals and public buildings – while encouraging greater dependency on cars.
There are more than enough derelict sites in England to meet demand for many decades, as is proven by government figures. And the US Green Building Council has shown that even the oldest, draughtiest accommodation in a dense urban centre provides a more environmentally efficient form of living than an ecohome in a new greenfield location. We should all "fear bad building"; but we also have an obligation to make sure that well-designed buildings are in the right place.
Richard Rogers
Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners
• Julian Glover quotes a minister as saying: "People have a bizarrely crude view of green space and think anything with a blade of grass on it is worth preserving." Well, yes, round these parts we do – but then we live in a city, where the planners, along with their friends in the building industry, seem to think any space without a house on it is just "waste land". If there really is a housing crisis, why isn't more effort put into occupying empty houses, and outlawing second homes?
Jim Grozier
Brighton
• It's not the planning system stopping homes being built. Developments have been allowed to go ahead whether communities want them or not – for example the Tesco takeover of our high streets, contributing to the loss of 12,000 small shops during the economic downturn.
The planning system needs to be fixed, not thrown out. Planning laws must ensure that developers consider the sustainability of their proposals – from the energy efficiency of new homes to the protection of natural habitats.
The government should place communities at the heart of sustainable development – for example by encouraging schools, hospitals and housing estates to produce their own green electricity.
Naomi Luhde-Thompson
Planning adviser, Friends of the Earth
• Julian Glover's article on planning misses many crucial points. Biodiversity is in crisis, with pollinating insects and nature in dangerous decline. Habitats are gone. Inbreeding is weakening them as there are smaller and fewer "islands" for them to inhabit. Host food crops (wild flowers) are disappearing. Green fields may be boring, but with future food shortages we need boring agricultural land. Also, green fields absorb carbon.
"Homes must be built." Really? Try refurbishing the one million empty homes first. In this part of Yorkshire, where suburban sprawl is spreading ever further, nearby Leeds has thousands of empty homes, as do nearby mill towns with their stone houses. Commuting to Legoland is not the answer.
Our planning laws are unjust: developers have applications turned down but have unlimited opportunities to reapply, wearing down local people, who lack the resources to keep on fighting – for years. Let there be justice and give the locals, environment and landscape a chance.
Hilary Fenten
Chairwoman, Craven branch, Campaign to Protect Rural England
• Julian Glover raises some important issues, but what planning needs is not some tinkering by the government to address what they see as delay but a mature debate on the role of the planning system in the 21st century. The perceived problem that the housing shortage can be solved by relaxing planning controls is at best misinformed and at worst a dismantling of the planning system. The problem is not the number of planning permission granted but the ability of the developer to bring forward the developments that have planning permission. In many London boroughs there are many unimplemented planning permissions that could go some way to providing much needed housing but for lack of finance or because, to avoid flooding the market, the developers do not proceed with the development. To change the use class orders, as suggested by the government, to enable a change of use from industrial/commercial to housing is unlikely to do anything other than inflate land prices by around 300% on gaining the change of use. While in relation to town centres, residents often want the local authority to have more control to stop local shops changing to bookmakers or other developments that change the nature of the high street. Needless to say, no one has addressed the dilemma of changing use class orders with localism, where the government wants to see more local resident involvement. So rather than tinker, let's look at the system, how it works, how local people can get involved and how to achieve more housebuilding.
Brian Hodge
London