'Our village's green fields have become grey belt'

Standing at the entrance to a field popular with dogwalkers on the edge of a Surrey village, parish councillor and campaigner Paula Moss is frustrated.

For decades, the land surrounding Effingham has been part of the green belt which made it very hard to build on.

A recent assessment has found it meets the criteria to be reclassified as a new category of land, known as "grey belt", which could make it easier to develop.

Moss claims the assessment suggests the government's tests for identifying grey belt land are not working and are undermining a policy that she thinks is, in principle, "a great idea".

"It's a bit like going fishing for tuna and catching more dolphin," she says.

"It's actually supposed to identify brownfield sites, previously developed sites, car parks, scrubland, that sort of thing.

"But in fact what it's actually doing is identifying land like the land behind us which is clear, open fields that separate villages."

Now residents, councillors and MPs are coming together to call on the government to rethink the policy.

Ministers introduced the concept of grey belt in 2024 to make it easier to build on "low quality" land in the green belt and gave examples such as scrubland or disused carparks.

Then Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said it would allow "sensible use" to be made of greenbelt land to build more homes.

In practice, campaigners such as the CPRE say much of the land being identified as grey belt is previously undeveloped green fields.

In Guildford borough, where Effingham sits, a recent assessment found 92% of the green belt should be classified as grey belt.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said there were "already strong protections in place for green spaces" and it was "ultimately for councils to decide whether land should be classed as grey belt".

Fiona White, lead councillor for planning at Guildford Borough Council, confirmed that more land had become grey belt but was clear it did not mean "that the whole of Guildford borough is available for development".

She added that no decisions had been made about where future development may take place.

The authority is currently developing a local plan which will set out where development should happen and said any planning applications received in the meantime would be considered on their own merits.

The Liberal Democrat MP for Guildford, Zoe Franklin, said the council had no choice but to apply the government's definition of grey belt.

"These rules leave too much room for interpretation," she said.

"I have challenged ministers to strengthen protections for our villages and ensure that developers deliver the infrastructure they promise."

She is joining Moss, White and a number of councillors at a public meeting on Friday in East Horsley to discuss the issue.

The problem, according to Moss, is that land is only evaluated in relation to its role in helping towns, not villages.

The green belt, established more than 70 years ago to stop towns growing too large or sprawling into one another, also protects the settings of historic towns.

The criteria set by the government for grey belt land, under the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), only relates to how it contributes to those functions.

A footnote, which had allowed villages to use other environmental or heritage policies to argue that land should remain green belt, was removed from the document in August.

Moss, who founded the campaign group Rural Roar, described footnote seven, as it was known, as "the thread by which the land outside many villages was actually hanging".

"It's basically complete erasure of the value of land around villages. That's what's happened with a single footnote," she said.

She added that Effingham had designated space inside the village for development but feared reclassification could open up the land on its outskirts to speculative development.

Classifying land as grey belt does not automatically mean it can be developed.

A site would still need to meet some "golden rules" set by the government.

These include delivering more affordable housing, better infrastructure and new or improved green spaces.

An industry body which represents housebuilders argues that the grey belt policy could actually result in less green space being lost, by helping developers avoid isolated sites in the countryside.

"Many people already live in something that used to be green," said Rico Wojtulewicz from the National Federation of Builders.

"We shouldn't lock people out of housing, purely because we can't see the vision for placemaking."

He said more housing would also bring infrastructure such as roads or doctors surgeries.

"If you want a community in the middle of nowhere, oppose grey belt, but if you want better places to live and housing for everybody, then we've got to have a land-use strategy," he added.

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