New Government research to be released today has shown that 180,000 homes have been built on back gardens in the past five years. It picks out the London suburbs as a hot-spot of garden grabbing.
"Having consistently raised this issue in recent years, I was pleased to see the Mayor finally put a clear statement against garden grabbing in his London Plan. But London’s suburbs will remain under threat so long as their gardens are classified as brownfield land ripe for development.
"I think of brownfield as ex-industrial land, not a back garden. If the Government wants to protect gardens it needs to re-classify them as gardens or greenfield."
Whilst London boroughs have the powers to reject development on back gardens, they struggle to do so unless they clearly state a presumption against this development in their planning policy. Even then, the pressure to meet housing targets and to develop on brownfield land can work against defending back gardens.