Will Boris Johnson's controversial housing plans end the British countryside as we know it?

During lockdown virtually all of us living in nice houses in the countryside said how lucky we were. On our not very socially isolated walks, we would say how sorry we felt for people living in tower blocks with no gardens or space for children to play. At the time everybody meant it, but will that sentiment survive the practical challenges posed by demands to build more houses and open up the countryside to outsiders? And how will rural areas be changed by coronavirus?

Lockdown certainly wasn’t easy for everybody in the countryside, but for some it awoke a kind of nostalgia for a time when neighbours helped each other and tractors trundled in splendid isolation through the lanes. Life moved very slowly, which left time for chatting. Villages weren’t hollowed out during the day by people commuting to work. There was a wonderful silence which made it seem as if the birds were singing louder. Local shops sprung up around pubs and there was a real sense of community—albeit powered by the very modern device of WhatsApp.

If you asked people what they would like to preserve from that time under lockdown, it was that sense of community. But strong communities can be inward looking and suspicious of outsiders, as was evident in Cornwall with placards warning second home owners and tourists to stay away. They had reason to fear anything that might increase the infection rate in areas short of medical facilities, but the suspicion went deeper than that, and touched on a kind of rural xenophobia. I found myself wiping down the bench outside my front gate with bleach for fear that urban viruses would leap from onto it from a rambler’s waterproofs.

Now the challenges to the countryside are more fundamental, both in terms of preserving what was good about this period, and adapting to the challenges ahead. What those of us living in the countryside have is space. And despite our sympathy for people living in tower blocks, it doesn’t necessarily extend to going along with housing developments that would allow more people to move to the countryside. The Council for the Protection for Rural England does campaign strongly nationally for more affordable housing in rural areas but their members locally tend to see that in terms of houses for local people, which ought to be set aside for key workers like nurses, rather than families from towns.

The government’s planning white paper, published after MPs left Westminster for the summer recess, claimed that its approach would encourage more attractive development in renewal areas, but architects and the Town and Country Planning Association are far from convinced. It has also made it easier for developers not to have to build any affordable housing on small and medium sized sites.

The prime minister’s exhortation to “build build build” sent a shiver to the spines of many people living in rural areas close to towns not circumscribed by the green belt. The white paper proposed a system of “zoning,” categorising land as either areas for ”growth”, where substantial development would be allowed—in effect outlining planning permission in advance—“Protected,” which would include the green belt and sites of special scientific interest, and areas designated under the Housing Act as rural like national parks—where it would be very difficult to build—and finally, “Renewal."

It’s this last category which will lead to the battles in the shires because the paper also proposes to impose a top down housing target on local authorities with the figures highest in those areas where unaffordability is highest. So if local authorities in areas like Surrey (not genuinely rural in the eyes of countryside snobs, but jealously guarded nonetheless) or Oxfordshire, where houses are very unaffordable, are to meet their building targets, they will have to build on green fields as long as they are not in the green belt. I put this conundrum to the Department of Communities who replied with the splendidly opaque answer: “the very strict controls on development in the green belt would continue under these reforms and most other undeveloped  land would also be protected (other than that needed to meet local development requirements).”

The paper also talks about “gentle densification” as opposed to gentle gentrification. In renewal areas, developers may have to build on brownfield land—which they don't like, because it's more expensive—if  more attractive sites are excluded. Some people with children of their own looking to live in rural areas may be less hostile to development, but it’s still difficult to see rural residents marching behind Boris’s banner of “build, build, build.”  Certainly don’t build in my backyard, unless I happen to be the farmer that owns it.

There is no shortage of people wanting to move to the countryside post Covid. Estate agents report a big increase in people looking for houses with spaces for a study and a garden. According to one survey in May, 40 per cent of Londoners said they would consider moving to the country (though that figure may be artificially inflated by people looking at property porn in country life during lockdown.) That could mean unaffordability—already higher across rural England than the UK as whole—gets worse The question, as always, is whether supply should meet demand or need. I write as somebody who 14 years ago chaired a commission on affordable rural housing and struggled with this distinction.

Of course, it is argued that if more development was allowed around villages, then it might help sustain local shops that had a new lease of life during lockdown. But the reality is that many of these shops are not likely to last that long. Unemployment in the countryside is going to increase sharply and cash-strapped families may not be able to go on paying higher prices at local shops. In the same way, pubs are going to be squeezed by a combination of lower disposable incomes among customers, social distancing requirements and a general lack of spontaneity—popping down to the pub is not going to be possible in the old way. All of which could accelerate the already frightening rate of pub closures.

Some local retailers hope that shoppers will be more nervous about going to big towns, and that this may help them, but, much as Johnson might like the high streets to be buzzing with customers shopping for Britain, it may be difficult to get them there. Allowing shops to be used for residential buildings and offices may prevent the infinitely depressing sight of boarded up shops, but it will hardly create an exciting environment for shopping in the stores that are left.

And what about home working? Many of those who worked from home would very much like to continue it, only going into London or other hubs once or twice a week. But if they don’t go back to commuting, what will happen to local transport links? National Rail isn’t going to be able to sustain the existing level of service if there are only half a dozen passengers in every carriage. In time, hygiene on trains will no doubt improve, but that won’t be enough to keep services going if there has been a fundamental change in working patterns.

Increased home working raises other issues. On the positive side it may lead to pressure for better broadband, which would help not just the well-off but those poorer families whose kids couldn’t access homework online because of lack of bandwidth. That in turn may make it easier for patients to connect with health consultants remotely, though many fear that lockdown has fatally undermined the old role of the local GP who knew his patients by name and saw them in their own homes.

Since the easing of lockdown, there has been far more emphasis on the benefits of exercise, though it is difficult to see doctors handing our prescriptions for cycling in hilly areas such as where I live in Wiltshire. Outsiders are welcomed by the pubs and the tourist industry, but others worry that all this may lead to increased demands for access to private land such as what happened after the Second World War. Landowners traditionally guard private land jealously, preferring to open up their land to people who pay good money to come and shoot pheasants than walkers who, they fear, will let their dogs frighten the game and leave gates open everywhere.

But the end of Europe's Common Agricultural Policy means big changes are ahead. The Agriculture Bill now going through parliament means farmers will be paid for “public goods” rather than subsidies based on the amount of land farmed. That could lead to a big increase in access and open up the countryside to groups who until now have been regarded with suspicion. Black Lives Matter should not just be a slogan in urban areas. The countryside is overwhelmingly white. One of the most valuable vehicles for delivering affordable housing is to restrict it to local people—which effectively rules out people of different ethnicities. Yvette Cooper pointed out to me years ago when she was Labour's housing minister and I chaired the commission on affordable rural housing. One solution could be to increase the amount reserved for essential workers like care workers who are desperately needed in rural areas. Because the population is, on average, older, and house price high, carers were in short supply way before the pandemic.

At times during lockdown, it seemed as if the clock had been turned back in the countryside to a kinder, quieter age. It also got off lightly in terms of infections so far, but it is not going to be able to escape the long term consequences of the pandemic, and the political necessity to build more houses. The effect could well be to increase the existing pressure on land, and accelerate the trends towards fewer services.

But this isn’t the first time the countryside has had to house escapees from the plague. Near me is a village called Little Salisbury which, local legend has it, was built to house those fleeing disease in Salisbury.