Government's eco-towns plan branded a 'farce'

The Government's flagship eco-town initiative to provide environmentally friendly housing was today branded a "farce" by Tories.

Shadow housing minister Grant Shapps claimed the project would only deliver a tiny fraction of the homes needed to meet the national shortage, and the dwellings would be built to lower environmental standards than other developments.

He said more properties would be built working with local communities rather than through a "Soviet-style" Whitehall project.

The Government is considering 15 proposals for the new towns, which will aim to tackle both the housing shortage and the problem of climate change.

But Mr Shapps said: "The problem is that there's almost nothing green left about these plans whatsoever."

The scheme had "descended into the sort of farce" seen with the introduction of the Home Information packs, he claimed.

He claimed the proposed new towns would only provide around 75,000 homes by 2016 and would only be built at the Government's Sustainability Code 3 - when all other properties built in 2016 would be at Code 6.

He told MPs: "The simple fact is more homes can be produced when you work with communities rather than coming up with large, centrally-driven, Whitehall-driven, top-down, Soviet-style planning from the centre."

Opening the Commons topical debate, Housing Minister Caroline Flint said the "exciting" proposals would create sustainable communities rather than simply green homes.

She said: "Eco-towns offer us a unique opportunity not only to address the housing shortage and to tackle climate change, but also to seek to trigger economic growth across a whole area."

But Labour's David Taylor (NW Leicestershire) said there was "suspicion"
that the project was an "underhand way of building new towns in quick time, to the detriment of the local environment and to the profit of property developers".

Ms Flint said: "The eco-town programme allows us to see if there are ways within a whole town development to demonstrate how in this country ... we can become world leaders in what will be, increasingly, the way in which we will build houses in the future."

Mr Shapps said there was "very little chance" of the projects proceeding through to being built and said it was "logistically impossible" to build the scale of homes laid down by the Government.

He said the plan was "falling apart" and ministers should scrap it.

But Labour's Patrick Hall (Bedford) hailed the scheme as a "positive opportunity" to build more homes and advance the case of "good planning".

For the Liberal Democrats, Lembit Opik said that by calling them eco-towns, the Government ran the risk of being accused of "gimmickry".

He said: "All new housing should be eco-friendly." But to meet the Government's target on carbon neutral homes would require a 200 million per cent increase on what had been built so far.

Labour former housing minister Nick Raynsford said there was a very strong case for new towns and urged the Tories to be more constructive.

He said while development had been concentrated on previously-used brownfield sites, building on greenfield sites could no longer be avoided.

Tory Edward Garnier (Harborough) said the Penbury eco-town planned in his area would be built on a site that was "not genuine brownfield land".

Labour's Sir Peter Soulsby, whose Leicester South constituency borders Mr Garnier's, said ministers had not proved there was sufficient employment or transport for the Penbury town.

Sir Peter also expressed concerns that it would harm the regeneration of Leicester, but said: "I do believe that eco-towns as a concept are very much to be welcomed - I do believe that they will make a significant contribution to housing need."

Tory Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) said the Marston Vale project in her constituency would only serve as a commuter town for 40,000 people who would travel to London every day to work.

Ms Dorries said: "There are no jobs in the area. People are going to have to commute to London. They are going to get into their cars. What is sustainable about 40,000 people having to travel 50 miles into London?"

Nick Gibb (C Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) said eco-towns risked by-passing local planning decisions in favour of "diktats" issued from Whitehall.

But Ms Flint, winding up the debate, said: "I have heard a lot of reasons about not having eco-towns, but I have to say from the benches opposite I haven't heard much reassuring noises about how we actually meet housing need in these communities as an alternative to eco-towns."

She added: "The fact is that we need homes, but we need cleaner, greener homes and built in more sustainable communities.

"That's my ambition and that's what I'm going to try and deliver."

Later, Ms Flint dismissed Mr Shapps' claims on sustainability codes as "complete nonsense".

She said in a statement: "The Government is working with industry to deliver zero-carbon new homes from 2016. Eco-towns will go much further and sooner - they must be zero-carbon across the whole development, not just homes but also shops, schools and workspaces too.

"The scale afforded by the eco-town programme provides the opportunity for green innovation which will have wider benefits for the existing community and future new building."