The Times, behind the times, but catching up is good. Тајмс, иза времена, али сустиже је добро.

Be Sure to Understand:

This land above has no value socially, culturally, environmentally or aesthetically.

It can, nay must, be forsaken and destroyed for housing and offices.

You have no right to oppose or appeal.

Once developed the UK will PROGRESS!

Once developed it will have a value and you'll be grateful for the banks may smile down upon you!

The noble Times news paper finally awoke to the risks of biodiversity offsetting over the last few days. Glad they could join us. Better late than never. Biodiversity Offsetting is coming to a green field near you and journalists have awoken. 

Of course Owen Patterson was straight out there saying that it would be highly unlikely that Ancient Woodland would be destroyed for development. Well lets take in to consideration:

1. This Government is already deconstructing planning control, so how would they know?

2. The vanity project HS2 will be destroying tens of ancient woodlands.

3. Back in the summer the Government sanctioned 32ha of Ancient Woodland destruction at Oaken Wood in Kent.

4. The Government has said nothing about the proposed motorway service station at Junction 35 of the M1 in Sheffield that would destroy an Ancient Woodland. 

Sorry Owen, your platitudes do not wash, at all. You can not be trusted with the environment, and even if you could be trusted just protecting Ancient Woodland is not good enough. With so many empty properties and brownfield sites there is no excuse for any greenfield loss in any circumstances.

Lord Wilson reckons 92% of the UK is not developed so a loss here, a loss there is not significant. So the implication is that it is fine that developers can roll ahead until the only green space left is SSSI and AONB.....is that a UK you want?

Yet still the Lobbying Bill progresses. Just in case you do want to say what is right for you and your part of the UK the Government will gag you in any case. The Lobbying Bill quite shamelessly seeks to stop those nasty charities and campaign groups from lobbying MP's, yet treats private lobbyist differently, those private sector lobbyist involved in destroying your environment, or involved in the arms trade, or involved in tobacco or alcohol that costs the Governments purse so so so much. These companies can buy in anti-democratic lobbying firms and still access Government, yet Cancer Research, RSPB, RSPCC etc (with all their nasty ways and political bias) would not be able to Lobby! 

The Government seem to think that it's the charities and campaigners who are spending the £2 billion/year on lobby-firms and not the private sector. Really. Enough of my words, what does Bishop of Oxford Lord Harries say of the bill? 

"profoundly undermining the very fabric of our democracy". 

Angela Eagle calls it 'sinister' and I agree.

The Conservative Government Manifesto said “Vote blue, go green” and this was their environmental mantra back in 2010. The manifesto said they had the

“responsibility to be the greenest government in our history”.

The Government has sought to reform the planning structures that have been developed through the wisdom of time, introduced the vile hypocrisy of biodiversity offsetting and now wants to gag the complainants - hectares upon hectares of greenbelt is threatened with infested rancid development, there are protest groups springing up like Japanese knotweed across the country, many lose the fight or will to fight through lack of legal and professional strength and the continuing name calling of opponents. They have no hope in the future.

All my years of environment enhancement is for nothing.

Does the Environment have any meaning to Politicians - No! - Да ли има било какво значење животне средине политичарима - Не!

The Government and it's spineless co-voters of all parties are playing a game that is humiliating us all, they are laughing at us. one example. HS2 Environmental Statement 50,000 pages, 8 weeks to read, digest, understand and comment. Compared with the much needed in depth consultation for tractor speed limits at a weighty 24 pages in two documents which has 12 weeks consultation. I have tried to resist being course, but actually this Government and it;'s co-voters don't give a toss what you think and even less than that when it comes to the environment, landscape and society. So long as over-paid executives can have an extra 40 mins to finish Sudoku Extreme over a cafe and cinnamon swirl to hell with any other consideration. Enough for now, but there is more yet!

Austerity - The Osbourne Way

George Osbourne today announcing £11.5 billion of cuts mainly focused on your local Government while also forcing through parliament
a Bill which authorises preparatory expenditure on a railway (HS2 - London's Train or the Private Sectors 1st Class Charter) without specifying further detail of the route and a limit on expenditure.

How austere is that?

Your local services are being cut to pay for a vanity project for London.


For the detail: http://www.dodsmonitoring.com/downloads/Bills2013/High_Speed_Rail_(Preparations)_Bill.pdf


STOP PRESS a day after writing this the predicted expenditure on HS2 jumped by £10 billion (again!). Good austerity measures! Strange that it is almost how much your local government are losing....

Myth Busting on Housing Supply - Мит пући због стамбене понуде

Yet another bit of fun and games from the development sector, oh it's so difficult for them in the times of global recession.

The UK Government has been very keen to inform us how inefficient local authorities are and how their planning bureaucracy has made life oh so difficult for developers.

In the press this week we learnt that actually local authorities have been progressing planning applications for housing, but the developers have then not developed the land!!

Behind this is quite a naughty game developers are playing with our greenbelts.

We are constantly told by political parties who are lobbied by the developers that there is a shortage of housing supply so we MUST build more. Government have as a consequence of this mis-information deregulated the planning process to the point of a rubber stamp exercise as the presumption to develop now holds sway. Thus more applications are expected from the development sector and some are developed, the rest are 'land banked' as assets, because the local authority rubber stamp places a real financial premium on that land. While the land is banked it is locked from other (perhaps better uses) and becomes under-utilised, neglected and unmanaged. Nevertheless the development companies still have a piece of land to develop or sell on with inflated prices. Land becomes an over-inflated asset for the company shareholders to speculate on. This artificially high value is also viewed as an asset by accountants thereby enabling developers to look in better business shape than they are. Land values in the accounting systems should be valued on their present state (ie underused/derelict) rather than on the speculative value of land holding development hope-value.

The land remains locked, feeding the myth that land supply is too low for the alleged housing needs of the country, the more scarce land becomes the higher value it has and this in turn perpetuates the myth that there is not enough land to build on. This then leads developers to say land supply is short and it's all the local authorities fault while they sit on hectares of land creating a future enhanced value for their shareholders.

Ludicrous. All housing applications should be put on immediate hold while Government assesses the extent of land banking by development companies.

 

Highly technical MS Visio flow chart of what the rascals are up to.

How will you feel when the developer comes to a green belt like yours and says it is our moral duty (see previous blogs) to allow housing to ruin our green inheritance? How much will it annoy you that when they will rail road through their planning application with scant regard for local choice and democracy that they then sit on the land for 10 years as a grossly inflated asset, blighting the land but speculating on its falsified hope-value?

Not so good I suspect.

By the way, in my blog Localism and the Developer (below) the council voted through the proposals that were so vehemently opposed by local people. The local paper even held a vote and 82% voted against the proposals, yet the council approved the proposal, even having the impertinence and arrogance to say that they saw the papers poll as unrepresentative! They probably saw the march as unrepresentative too and all those objection letters. Councillors failed their duty to serve the people who voted them in to power. Developers continue to own local democracy, not you or I. It is most vexatious!

Have we sold our souls? Consevation (dis)credits. Да ли смо продали наше душе? Цонсеватион (не) кредита

Apologies for the lack of posts. Moved house again and consequently busy, and before you ask I didn't buy one on a desecrated greenfield site, I bought a recycled shop that's a 150 years old that used to be a cobblers and corsitiers. We are recycling in the housing market. Builders are renovating some parts of the house, so in mid recession we support local business and the local economy.

Since the 21st April I have been keen to blog, for there is sinister news afoot from the world of 'development'.

On that Sunday the Times published a story entitled 'Developers can pay to rip up nature'. For many years the environment sector has striven with tenacity and intellect to demonstrate to Government and others that nature has an economic value whether that be an inferred value or a direct functional value. In the past we have used this argument to justify funding for the delivery of environmental work. The Newlands Project strongly demonstrated that non-environmentalists can see that the green environment can assist in development and economics. The North West Regional Development Agency would not have spent £50 million with the Forestry Commission and Community Forests without a realisation that the environment had a role to play in inward investment and image of a region.

It now seems we danced with the devil.

The devil, in the guise of the UK Government, is now heading for an interpretation of these values as an environmental offset for development. The direction now seems to be that any development could happen so long as a developer puts money aside for 'conservation credit' - a thorough juxtaposition if ever there was one! The proposals for the biodiversity off-setting suggests habitats can be disemboweled from locations and established on farm land elsewhere. I am sure the farmers who lose production as a consequence will be falling over themselves to give land away from food production to conservation....

Furthermore there seems to have been zero consideration to domestic food security and land supply under this proposal.

Some conservation groups are now desperately back tracking by saying it is difficult to put meaningful values on conservation assets, yet we have used this to fund environment work in the past! The problem lies in the fact that we have waltzed with Beelzebub and now we pay. It is however just another ruse for Government and Developers to avoid planning and sustainable development issues. As said before little boxes for us to live in must be built at all costs, apparently.

So how will this con-trick work, well Government reckon they can assign generic values to meadows, woodlands and the like so, according to the Times, a meadow maybe worth £10,000/ha and a woodland £40,000ha and a developer will have to quantify how much of these habitats they will destroy and make a payment to the laughably named Environment Bank as the leading broker in this scam. I am looking forward to seeing how these valuations take place. A scrub woodland on the edge of London must have a different value from and Ancient Woodland Site on the HS2 route of destruction. Who will assess this, who will agree, will the developers negotiate it downwards to a low value in any case?

Indeed the rows have started already, I dare anyone to logically put a value to Nightingale habitat who works in the development sector or indeed the environment sector. The Kent Wildlife Trust have one heck of a job on their hands in attempting to credit the conservation value of Lodge Hill (see http://www.kentwildlifetrust.org.uk/what-we-do/planning/lodge-hill). More here too: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/29/nightingales-lodge-hill-mod-site. The ignorance of non-environmentalists knows no bounds, the council says it can move Nightingales to any new woodland created out of the Conservation Con Credits, however that new woodland will be too young to provide the correct habitat and how do you tell a small brained avian that it needs to redirect the post!

Sadly I think we have lost, the Environment sector did engage the devil and this is our payback. Fools we have been, conned by Con' Credits.

It's so sad, but I hope this at least leaves you smiling and warm (unusually - thanks to the Daily Mail, it's not often you'll read me write those words!):

'That was wonderful, darling. Did the earth move for you too?'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2332433/Mac--The-Governments-housing-policy.html#ixzz2WBzvQcte

Also reference: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2331847/Houses-better-green-fields-Ministers-explosive-claim-unveils-new-plans-concrete-countryside.html

STOP PRESS

It seems DEFRA will consult on these proposals from 18th July. I also hear that the drive will be about making the planning process quicker (ie to favour developers) and that developers will only have to mitigate for loss associated directly with their development, the inference being there will be loss of habitat from historical misuse of natural resources, therefore one can assume a previously damaged ancient woodland will not be treated as such even though it may still be a wood....one to think about - will developers target damaged conservation assets for new build? The scheme is also likely to be national, ie it assumes loss of woodland in Aberdeen may be compensated for by habitat work in Penzance!

As I have seen Marc Naura write Conservation Credits are morally wrong, in that it suggests damaging ecology and habitats is fine as long as you do something (anything) good elsewhere! As Marc rightly says this will lead developers to show scant if any regard for ecology.

Also I wonder what percentage brokers will take from this scam.

I bet developers won't be bothered to find mitigation sites and the money sits in the interest accounts of the brokers and Government.

It is not good, not good at all.

Felling the Oak and Insincerity - Сечење храст и искреност

I am not anti conservative, I am not anti labour. I view myself as a free thinker, not politically aligned, but if you want to put me in a red/yellow/blue box then that is your choice, not mine. I don't like insincerity and double-speak from any party. The party presently in power said in their manifesto:

We will protect the environment for future generations, make our economy more environmentally sustainable, and improve our quality of life and well-being. There is no contradiction between going green and supporting the economy – we can and will do both.
http://www.conservatives.com/Policy/Where_we_stand/Environment.aspx

I wholly support the concept that the environment and economy go together. As a society that aspires to be civilised this is exactly the right approach (three pillars of sustainability being Environment, Economy and Society).

Conservatives in their budget said:

An extra £15bn for new road, rail and construction projects by 2020, starting with £3bn in 2015-16(BBC Website)

While at the same time failing to recognise our roads and infrastructure are falling apart. Why are they falling apart? Because the maintenance budget is already unsustainably high and every local authority in the country has no money left, or staff left. or both.

The Government worsened this situation by capping public sector pay rises to 1% = the brain drain in local authorities continue and the cap means a 1.5% cut in pay for the employee in real terms. You pay peanuts and you'll get monkeys; mind you the more monkeys the Conservatives get in to Local Authorities the more they can turn their myth of the public sector as useless in to fact. Furthermore why do all parties say you can't cap or tax the high flyer's in business because we will lose those great people to other countries, yet it is acceptable to not allow the high achievers in the public sector to flourish or be rewarded. The Local Authority brain drain accelerates with this budget.

So we're going to spend £15billion on roads and construction but have absolutely zero idea where the maintenance cash will come from.

I also read:

Pottery industry in Midlands to be exempt from climate change levy................

So the Government believes in climate change clearly as they have a climate change levy, strange that, Mr Gove wants to remove it from our children's education at school (see: http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/why-its-a-mistake-to-trim-climate-change-from-the-curriculum-8540423.html). So let's get this right, Government taxes business and individuals for the affects they have on the climate (unless you live in Stoke) and have a Department of Energy and Climate Change, but they don't want your children educated in climate change. I wonder why. This will keep future generations in the dark for sure.

And the oil slick on top of the cake is the a tax INCENTIVE for fracking;
Tax allowances for investment in shale gas (BBC website). I am no expert on fracking, but concerns have been raised and it's a desperate way to retrieve energy if it is true that the energy spent extracting shale gas is greater than what will be extracted. In other words wasting energy to get energy.

If this was a true green Government they should tax greenfield development to the value equivalent or more than brownfield development and/or regeneration and further tax incentivise wood fuel, solar and tidal energies. I think its time they felled the tree on their logo and replaced it with a logo consisting of an empty shopping mall and an unmaintained road leading to it.

PS, According to a BBC the Government also provided nil incentives in the budget for the self employed, small businesses and enterprises...and they wonder why Town High Streets are failing...?!

Localism and the Developer (alias David and Goliath) - Локализам и програмера (алиас Давид и Голијат)

A really good protest march in my home town against the proposed development of a modern shopping centre in a traditional market town. The market town I live in isn't particularly pretty, planners have already a made a dogs dinner of it in the past with Costa Coffee occupying a Germanic style building, while next door is the glass fronted modern architecture of a Bank and across the town square from there some kind of neo-classical town hall with Tuscan columns supporting a portico. So overall pretty well architecturally confused, without theme, reason or rhyme. Planners and developers want the residents to accept similar mistakes all over again with new proposals.

Planners do not seem to be aware of the internet. We shop on the internet. It is a powerful tool that decimates our high street shops. We shop in shopping malls (appalling though they truly are). Cities and Malls have the big brands and the smaller towns can not retain them any longer. My home town needs to do some serious looking in to the future, fill the small shops with local businesses and bespoke shops. Identify a theme and brand and stick with it.

They will of course fail because central Government keeps telling them different. That is the Government who are fat on the molasses of half truths from big development/building companies, preaching localism but ignoring the outputs of localism.

I hope the proposal to develop my market town gets kicked out, but for the time being here are some photos from local people performing localism, though it has to be said it was good to see an MP on a bench with a megaphone talking about only allowing brownfield development - time will tell if he can stick to his words.

 The Passive Mob of Concern

Fill these empty shops before building more

Local Small Retail Shops Supported the March (While one of the national brand shops was closing down - Early Learning Centre)

Planners and Councillors should be dealing with this....

...and this....

 ...and definitely this which has been empty for 10 years at least and a major detractor for inward investment.

David Rutley MP doing what MP's should do more of.

But David, the locals expect.

Is the message clear? Oh and by the way, where was the leader of the Council?