BUILDING on some Green Belt areas will be needed to solve the housing shortage in the UK, according to Labour’s Shadow Minister for Levelling Up.
Alex Norris MP told GB News: “We believe that there needs to be better protections for first-time house buyers to give them first dibs in their local community to stop them losing out to people who build who buy dozens and dozens just off plan.
“We also need to work on the supply of land in this country, we’ve got loads of people sitting at home who will know of former industrial sites. Brownfield sites have sat there for years and years, we need to bring them into use through proper purchase powers for local authorities.
“And to have, I know this is tricky, but this is one of those big solutions to big problems, to have a more honest conversation about when we talk about the Green Belt. What is Green Belt, what is not?”
He told Eamonn Holmes and Isabel Webster during Breakfast on GB News: “There are things that are classified as Green Belt that are anything but. We’re not talking about those rolling hills and beautiful fields that you’re talking about.
“We’re talking about a former car park, or a petrol station. Those things are currently classified in certain areas as Green Belt.
“What I’m saying is, let’s have an honest conversation, I only ask viewers to engage on those terms, that there is a difference between areas of outstanding natural beauty, national parks, lovely green rolling hills.
“As I say we’ve no ambition to build on those at all. But there are things within the Green Belt that are anything but green, and we need to be a bit more honest about that.”
He added: “I find that when you have the right infrastructure, roads, schools, doctors, people are actually much more amenable to building not least because it means housing for their children for their community and growth in the local economy.”
