Letter: The Tories Have Betrayed the Green Belt

Published on: 29 May, 2019
Updated on: 29 May, 2019

From Michael Bruton

Spokesperson for the Guildford Greenbelt Group

In response to: Mole Valley MP Drops Local Plan Bombshell By Suggesting Revision is Simple

Councils have to revise their Local Plans anyway, that is a legal obligation. But it takes ages, years even.

Meanwhile, the green belts, here and around other cities, are open to a developer “free for all”, or as someone recently said to me, “The Tories have hung out the villages (around Guildford) to dry,” with some Liberal Democrat connivance of course.

The silence of most Surrey Tory MPs on green belt and countryside protection is disgraceful. Why has Guildford’s MP apparently taken a vow of silence on the matter? Her constituency covers part of Waverley Borough where another dreadful Local Plan has been foisted on angered residents. As for two of the Tory Leadership contenders – Jeremy Hunt and Michael Gove – what have they ever done to protect their constituency’s countryside? One might expect an Environment Secretary to believe in the green belt!

The Tories have been routed in both parts of Paul Beresford’s constituency which covers Mole Valley and part of Guildford Boroughs. And deservedly so. His suggestions do not tackle the dire threat to our towns, countryside and the Metropolitan Green Belt. The latter started in the 1930s under the old London County Council as a green lung for London and its surrounding counties. All now abandoned by the Tories, centrally and locally. It is simply a betrayal.