Sir – The MPs who wrote assuring us that the new National Planning Policy Framework would not be harmful to the Green Belt and the countryside have either not read it, or not understood it, or are being economical with the truth.
The fact is that it contains a positive steer that swathes of villages should be taken out of the Green Belt; is heavily weighted for development at the expense of the environment; and removes the previous policy of brownfield land first, positively encouraging development on to green fields instead.
It is not true either that it gives locals a real say in development as it does not allow them to say “no” but only “yes” to developers’ plans.
It is clear that even the Prime Minister is at last awakening to the harm this policy would clearly cause and thrashing about for a way to climb down without appearing to do so. Time to tear this harmful nonsense up and start again Michael Tyce, Waterstock
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