BROMSGROVE’S MP has written to the new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, to urge him to reverse the “disastrous” 85 per cent increase in the district’s housing target.
Bradley Thomas has been campaigning against Sir Keir Starmer’s government’s decision to increase Bromsgrove’s housing target while reduced Birmingham’s target by 31 per cent.
A Parliamentary petition, signed by more than 5,000 people, demanded the Government justify the formula used to calculate the massive increase in Bromsgrove’s housing target and to rebalance so that Birmingham takes its fair share.
According to the latest “State of Brownfield 2025” report from the CPRE, there is enough brownfield land capacity in England to support a minimum of 1.41 million new homes, of which 55 per cent already has full or in-principle planning permission.
In his letter to the new Prime Minister, Mr Thomas asked Mr Burnham to work with him on his ‘common-sense’ housebuilding policy.
Mr Thomas said: “The new Prime Minister has said he wants to do politics differently, and in that spirit I want to work with him to implement a common-sense housing policy in this country.
“I know the Prime Minister shares my concerns about the destruction of the greenbelt given he opposes the building of 400 homes on greenbelt land in his constituency.
“I therefore hope he will work with me to adopt my common-sense approach to housebuilding, which is to build on brownfield land first, bring long-term empty homes back into use and provide communities with infrastructure first before any new houses are built.
“There’s just so much more the Government could be doing rather than building on our greenbelt.
“It just doesn’t have to be this way, and I won’t stop until this Government wakes up, sees sense and reverses their 85 per cent increase in our housebuilding target which will destroy our precious greenbelt as we know it.”
