Letter: It’s Not Nimbyism to Protect Our Green Spaces

Published on: 21 Sep, 2025
Updated on: 21 Sep, 2025

Ash Manor House

From Angela Richardson

former Conservative MP for Guildford

In response to: Poor Ash? Try Overrun Ash

Yes, poor Ash indeed. Countryside beyond the green belt with no protection from over-development. Much like Cranleigh and Alfold in Waverley.

They are all the places that both Guildford and Waverley have dumped housing with no infrastructure to mitigate, because they both took on 50 per cent of Woking’s unmet need in addition to requirements placed on them by central government.

Many say we need more housing. I say we need to sort out the numbers coming in to the country both legally and illegally first. That shouldn’t be controversial.

Once you concrete over green fields they are gone forever and you only need to look at the disasters that are the ghost towns of Milton Keynes and Cambridgeshire without the schools and GP surgeries promised, where no one wants to live. They are soulless.

It’s not nimbyism to get our priorities straight and protect our green spaces.

I would add that in addition, we should get rid of Stamp Duty. Many of our housing problems are due to the inflexible nature of our property sector.

Higher turnover in house sales and the increased employment around the sector will make up for the tax revenue lost in stamp duty.

Flexibility on location without taxation will help the struggling job market across the country too. People will be able to move for opportunity without constraints.

Responses to Letter: It’s Not Nimbyism to Protect Our Green Spaces

Anthony Mallard Reply

September 21, 2025 at 11:56 am

I totally agree with Ms Richardson’s view on what should be done to improve the housing market. I have just one question. Why didn’t the Conservative party do it during its many years in government when many opportunities to do so existed?
Peta Malthouse Reply

September 21, 2025 at 12:35 pm

Following fourteen years of failure to tackle these problems Angela Richardson’s ideas are not those shared by the Tory party.

Why did the Tory councils of Guildford and Waverley take responsibility for half the housing need of Tory-run Woking (which has been a suburban area for years)? The present chancellor has asked the civil service to look at stamp duty and council tax, both of which are regressive, with a view to replacing it with a land tax, a common system of taxation in Europe.

The problem about migration numbers is one wholly created by the Conservative party. Numbers of legal migrants massively increased after Brexit, amounting to almost a million in each of two years of Boris Johnson’s premiership, using his points-based system. “Illegal” migration was a door opened by Brexit and a total abrogation of responsibility in failing to negotiate a replacement of the Dublin Agreement which applied while we were in the EU.

Migration was the “dead cat” used by successive Tory governments to distract from the fact that no proper funding or planning for the nations basic needs for doctors, schools, shops and other services, leaving it all to market forces as usual.

There needs to be a grown up discussion about both migration and Chancellor Reeves’ attempts to develop a fairer tax system. Stamp duty and council tax are both unfair to the majority of voters. At least Ms Richardson and I ought to be able to agree that.
Angela Richardson Reply

September 21, 2025 at 3:23 pm

The last 14 months have swiftly put the last 14 years in the shade.

Not much we can do about the past other than learn lessons, but we can shape future policy and decision-making with ideas that work. That’s why the next few weeks of party conferences will be interesting so we can see what suggestions are put forward for discussion.

Angela Richardson is the former Conservative MP for Guildford.