We need to all be aware of Starmer's housing plans as your backyard could be next

We know that this government is YIMBY. Keir Starmer said so himself in October 2023: "Yes, I am." And with a bold pledge to build 1.5 million homes, that means a lot of homes in a lot of backyards - even on allotments, if housing secretary Angela Rayner is to be believed. Few deny the need. House prices have exploded over the past 50 years. If bread had risen at the same pace, it would now cost over £30 a loaf. Fewer millennials own homes than any generation since the 1920s. That hits prosperity, choice, freedom and social cohesion.

But how is Labour doing? And what does it mean for the towns, villages and green fields these new homes must occupy? If planning permission is nationalised, as it effectively is, then councils must be given reasons to say "yes" to developments. This leads to a culture of saying "no". After a backbench rebellion, the Conservatives scrapped mandatory housing targets in 2022. Labour's first big move was to bring them back - and bigger.

Councils must now meet ambitious housing targets, over 30,000 homes a month in total, or lose the right to reject developments. That's a huge ask as Britain hasn't built more than 18,000 homes a month in 45 years.

Then came a dramatic second step. In what one planning expert called "the seminal day since the Second World War on housing delivery", Labour ruled that Green Belt land can no longer be used as a blanket excuse to block new homes.

If councils miss their targets, they must release so-called "Grey Belt" land - areas in the Green Belt that are already degraded, disused, or near infrastructure. Think empty car parks, rundown industrial plots, or scrubby edges of towns.

The Labour government's Planning and Infrastructure Bill gives council officers, not elected councillors, more power to approve developments, therefore cutting delays. It also promises faster approval for infrastructure like roads and utilities.

Supporters say this is all pragmatic. Not all Green Belt land is beautiful or biodiverse. And England needs homes. But it's controversial. Because once the Green Belt starts to go, where does it stop?

And where will the bulk of this new housing go? The answer - outside the cities.

Despite the housing crisis being most acute in urban areas, Labour has cut London's housing target by 12% and scrapped the "urban uplift" policy that previously boosted targets in cities. Instead, the biggest increases are in the suburbs and countryside, especially in the south-east. Some local housing targets there have doubled.

And the homes will mostly be low-density greenfield builds, led by volume housebuilders. They'll sprawl, not stack. That's slower, land-hungry, and dependent on infrastructure. And not all "Grey Belt" will be unwanted car parks - much of it could well be green space under pressure. Like allotments.

Labour insists this won't herald a return to soulless postwar sprawl. It promises beautiful, walkable neighbourhoods, backed by new design powers, strategic plans, and reformed rules on land acquisition.

But the signs are worrying.

In November 2024, the Government scrapped the Office for Place, an organisation I helped create to support councils in building better, more beautiful places, and to promote popular intensification of existing streets, creating higher densities of population, as happens elsewhere in Europe. It was due to help councils intensify existing streets with local consent and to publish an annual review into placemaking across England. I hope I'm wrong but that agenda now seems abandoned.

The Conservative's 2023 Levelling Up and Regeneration Act gave ministers powerful tools to intensify urban streets, adding homes by growing towns from within. It's quicker and greener than building new roads into fields. A while swathe of policies to achieve this were ready in 2024. But they vanished after the election. A year on, they're still missing. A year has been wasted. Very disappointing.

So Labour is hitting the pedal hard on slow, greenfield expansion while putting the intensification of urban areas into reverse. It's an odd choice, and a risky one.

This is a huge political bet. Labour is wagering that voters, many priced out of the market or watching their children stuck renting, will accept new homes in their backyard if they are well-designed, well-placed, and genuinely affordable.

If that bet pays off, it could transform England's landscape for ever not just our housing future. If it fails, the backlash from Middle England could be fierce.

For now, few bulldozers are on the move. But the planning maps are being redrawn. Britain's housing battle has entered a new phase under Labour's housing gamble. And your backyard might be next.

Nicholas Boys Smith is the founder and chairman of Create Streets, www.createstreets.com