The perceived wisdom in planning policy seeks to restrict development in the countryside in favour of focussing it in towns and larger villages.  While this is the right general approach, there is little subtlety in the way planning policy is implemented.  It is often interpreted as over-restraint of development in small settlements and overkill in larger ones.  Our evidence points to the affordability of housing as a key issue for economic vitality but, contrary to current thinking and practice, it exists in the small settlements to a much higher degree than in the larger ones.  That is where it is felt most acutely too.  Strategic planners appear to consider that those in housing need in the countryside will simply move to the nearest large settlement to live in social rented housing (if it becomes available).  This is not only unlikely, but it actively destroys the communities in the villages and does little to boost economic development in rural areas.  Social engineering of this kind rarely works, and planning policy is a very poor instrument with which to do it.  

A better approach is to make the most of the opportunities that exist in small communities to provide affordable housing on an individual basis.  This should include self-build affordable housing, live-work on former farmsteads and other small scale initiatives that do not exclude any settlement from the possibility of development.  It is quite possible that such initiatives can operate successfully alongside a general policy of volume building and development in the main settlements; after all the countryside needs only small levels of development to maintain its vitality.

It is ironic too that the opportunities to provide truly sustainable zero carbon developments are often discouraged because they are considered to be ‘unsustainable’ from a locational point of view.  

Those that live in the countryside have, often through necessity, developed a high degree of self reliance.  This is a quality that should be harnessed rather than stifled.  The last thing the countryside needs is attempts to tackle these problems from a centralised top-down position.  More flexibility and subtlety in planning regulations would go along way to ease the situation and allow local communities to solve their own problems without needing huge amounts of scarce public investment.   

I'll pass them onto Stuart, and also to our Sustainable Rural Communities team.