By Roger Jarman

As we limp towards the end of this fractious parliament, housing has become a key political battleground. All the major parties call for more housebuilding to help deal with soaring homelessness, overcrowding and unaffordable housing costs. The Tory government has an objective to build 300,000 homes a year in England but has abandoned its policy that would have forced individual local authorities to hit housebuilding targets for their own areas. Labour’s answer is to reform the planning system and, in part, to build housing on areas of the green belt and reboot the post war model of new towns.

At a local level there are others forces at play that will limit housing supply of all kinds (not just new housebuilding). I live in Northfields, a West London suburb which is part of the London Borough of Ealing. Last year a tiny group of local residents persuaded the Labour-controlled council that Northfields should be designated a Conservation Area (CA). No recognised residents’ association was consulted about the proposal. An informal consultation exercise was undertaken under the auspices of the local authority asking residents if they wanted Northfields to be designated as a CA. Only 181 residents responded, representing just 2% of households in the area.

Even with this paltry response (and not all respondents were in favour) the council has pressed ahead with a statutory consultation exercise, asking the 7,000 affected households for their views on Northfields becoming a CA.

Northfields – where I have lived for over 40 years – is pleasant enough. But it’s nothing special. There are thousands of suburban neighbourhoods up and down the country just like Northfields, an area built following the construction of the Piccadilly Line in the early part of the last century. Indeed, the area should have been classed as a CA 120 years ago when it was a relatively coherent urban form made up of Edwardian terraced and semi-detached housing. But not now.

Many properties in Northfields have had extensions of all kinds and the exterior of many properties has changed beyond recognition – front walls have been rebuilt, porches have been added, windows have been replaced and some front gardens have been dug up and turned into hard standings for car parking (and the charging of electric vehicles these days).  Quite frankly, the area has ‘been and gone’ and cannot be judged as anything exceptional. It certainly ain’t no Belgravia or Hampstead Garden suburb.

But what’s my principal beef about Northfields becoming a CA?

I have many. But, basically, the declaration of a CA would stymie any new building in the area. There are one or two sites in the locality that could provide much-needed housing, but a developer would find it near impossible to build on those sites if a CA was declared. Furthermore, loft extensions would require full planning permission before they could proceed. An expensive and time-consuming process. Most loft extensions are now allowed under permitted development rights. Also, the construction of bungalows in garden land that run alongside our suburban streets would become (in effect) a thing of the past.

So, the supply of additional housing units/bedrooms/living space could be significantly curtailed by the creation of the CA. What’s more, the CA might – depending on the consequent changes to permitted development rights – see household efforts to improve the energy efficiency of their homes thwarted. The installation of solar panels and external wall insulation might fall foul of the new regulations. Bin covers in front gardens would undoubtedly need planning permission, as would cycle sheds. Permission would also be needed for some tree pruning. I kid you not.

And who would police this new CA? Ealing’s planning service is already under severe pressure, as are many others in London and beyond. Would the council really be able to recruit the staff needed to deal with all the additional work associated with the creation of the CA? And where would the funding come from?

Councillors would also get caught up in endless disputes about the application of the new planning rules. Is that what they really wanted to do when putting themselves up to serve our local community?

The London Plan calls for Ealing to facilitate the building of over 21,570 homes in the 10 years to 2028/29[i], many on small infill sites in neighbourhoods like mine. If a CA is declared in Northfields, that task would become that much more difficult. In a city like London, where density levels are one seventh those in Paris, we should add to our housing stock in a sensitive way in areas like Northfields. We also have most of the infrastructure to support incremental increases in our housing stock (although the electricity grid could be upgraded and we could do with more GP surgeries).

But this isn’t just a parochial issue affecting me and where I live. I’m afraid if NIMBY interests in other urban communities in London and elsewhere call for the creation of Cas, the opportunities to increase housing supply will become ever harder. As population increases through rises in net migration and for other reasons too, this can only lead to more homelessness, more overcrowding, and higher rents and house prices.

On a personal note, I’m glad my house already has a loft extension. Otherwise my adult daughter and her partner – both in professional occupations – would be homeless, seeing as they cannot afford to live independently in West London (the average price of a two-bedroom house in Northfields is £750,000). Intergenerational living is becoming more common. We need a flexible approach to the planning system to ensure that those living arrangements are facilitated not prevented.

CAs are needed in sensitive urban settings that contain buildings of significant architectural value.

But, please, not in areas like Northfields.

 

[i] ARUP, London Borough of Ealing – Regulation 18 Local Plan, November 2022. Of the total number of homes planned for the Borough over the ten years of the Plan, 4,240 would be built on ‘small sites’.