Ms Polly Billington

Thank you very much for your permission to speak in this debate, Madam Deputy Speaker. I want to support the representations from my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Laura Kyrke-Smith), because some of the things that she raises are also relevant to my constituency and those across the country. As my hon. Friend said, the case for more genuinely affordable homes is clear. That is accepted in my community as much as in hers, if not more so, as so many people struggle in the private sector and house prices spiral due to the pressure of unregulated short-term holiday lets, driven by many people’s huge and understandable desire to enjoy the delights of Margate, Broadstairs and Ramsgate. We need new homes. I have spoken to far too many people in their 30s and beyond who live in their childhood bedrooms, sometimes with a partner. They are desperate to be able to start their lives in a home of their own, but they are priced out of their own community. We also desperately need the infrastructure to support the families who will live in those homes, and we need to protect and enhance not only the nature that we love but the nature that is essential to our own economy, wellbeing and future. I came here to change the rules, Madam Deputy Speaker, although of course I observe the ones that you enforce in this House. It is clear that the current rules do not serve our need for homes or our need to protect and enhance nature. They do not enable the right infrastructure to be built, nor do they effectively help us identify and protect our vital farmland. Those who protect the status quo in this argument are condemning our country to failure. Those who think that any of these four elements—homes, farming, nature or infrastructure, including energy—should drop off the list of our priorities do not understand the importance of shaping our communities to benefit our residents, now and for the long term. Nature is not just a “nice to have”. It is fundamental to us in achieving our economic, health and climate goals. In Thanet, people come to see and enjoy our natural world. Damaging nature, where it is a vital part of the economy, is short-sighted and dangerous. We also have some of the most productive farmland in the whole of the UK, yet the existing planning rules do not protect it from speculation and development. Access to nature is proven to enhance health and wellbeing, and the successes of previous Labour Governments in creating access to nature for everyone are some of our proudest achievements. Furthermore, responsible custodianship of our natural environment, especially precious ecosystems, is vital to capturing, sequestering and reducing carbon emissions. The sixth carbon budget predicts that, by 2050, we will need to remove 39 megatonnes of CO₂ a year via nature-based solutions, which is more than double what we do today. That includes wetlands, woodlands and peatlands, which are both beautiful and useful. This Labour Government were elected on a mandate to transform us into a clean energy superpower by 2030 and to restore and protect 30% of nature by 2030. We cannot achieve those goals under the current rules. That is why I look forward to us publishing a land use framework that will help us to decide what we use land for, and help us to shape our communities and our country to meet our ambition to be somewhere with affordable homes to rent or own and run, affordable sustainable food, affordable secure home-grown clean energy, decent public services, and our beloved countryside providing us with the peace and climate security we all need.