{"id":525511,"date":"2025-10-24T20:28:15","date_gmt":"2025-10-24T20:28:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/525511\/"},"modified":"2025-10-24T20:28:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-24T20:28:15","slug":"high-court-battle-over-andy-burnhams-giant-housing-plan-ends-in-disappointment-for-campaigners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/525511\/","title":{"rendered":"High court battle over Andy Burnham’s giant housing plan ends in disappointment for campaigners"},"content":{"rendered":"

Campaigners challenged the Places for Everyone plan, alleging the Greater Manchester Combined Authority \u2018erred in law\u2019Manchester has seen a property boom in the last 25 years – its new local plan will direct development(Image: Manchester Evening News)<\/p>\n

Campaigners have been left \u2018disappointed\u2019 after their legal challenge against gigantic Greater Manchester housing failed.<\/p>\n

Activists claimed late-stage changes to the Places for Everyone (PfE) plan by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) \u2018erred in law\u2019. But following a High Court battle<\/a>, the presiding Mrs Justice Lang DBE found in favour of the Secretary of State and the GMCA.<\/p>\n

The PfE development plan, adopted 19 months ago, is expected to bring thousands of jobs, new homes, and sustainable growth across the city-region by 2039.<\/p>\n

Join the Manchester Evening News <\/strong>WhatsApp<\/strong> group <\/strong>HERE<\/a><\/p>\n

Stockport<\/a> council pulled out of the scheme, previously named Greater Manchester Spatial Framework, meaning only nine of the 10 Greater Manchester councils are involved.<\/p>\n

The grounds of challenge brought to the Royal Courts of Justice by Save Greater Manchester\u2019s Green Belt Ltd (SGMGB) was that GMCA inspectors erred in law by narrowing the scope of \u201cexceptional circumstances\u201d said to be legally capable of justifying additions to the green belt.<\/p>\n

\"MarjMarj Powner – one of the campaigners are opposing the development of New Carrington in the Places for Everyone plan(Image: Manchester Evening News)<\/p>\n

Campaigners claimed the land proposed to be Green Belt Additions was reduced by more than 75 per cent (over 500 hectares, across 30 sites). Initially, government inspectors were set to examine a proposal to add 49 areas to the green belt.<\/p>\n

However, during the 2023 inspection, this dramatically reduced to 17, later 19, after the GMCA said 30 sites \u2018did not meet\u2019 the new legal test. These additions were originally identified to partially compensate for the release of almost 2,500 hectares of environmentally and ecologically rich land from the green belt, according to SGMGB.<\/p>\n

However, the court concluded that it had not played a material role in keeping land out of the green belt.<\/p>\n

Mrs Justice Lang DBE\u2019s judgement read: \u201cI conclude that the Inspectors did not err in law by adopting an unduly restrictive legal test in determining whether exceptional circumstances for designating additional green belt sites had been established, as alleged by the claimant.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Image: Manchester Evening News)<\/p>\n

Speaking following the decision, Zoe Sherlock, chair of SGMGB said: \u201cWe\u2019d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone involved in our campaign, especially those who helped us to raise the phenomenal amount of money needed to bring this case to court.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven that the sites were dropped on the basis of a fake legal test, we are obviously very disappointed that, having found the test was not lawful, the court concluded that it was not material in keeping the sites out of the green belt.<\/p>\n

Join our Christmas in Manchester WhatsApp group HERE<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Leigh Day partner, Ricardo Gama, who represented SGMGB, added: \u201cWhile this is a disappointing result for our clients, they feel vindicated that the judge has agreed that the Greater Manchester councils were wrong to introduce a highly restrictive, and incorrect, legal test to determine whether sites were eligible to be added to the Green Belt.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir focus now will move to ensuring that individual planning applications comply with the policy requirements in the Places for Everyone plan.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GreaterGreater Manchester Mayor, Andy Burnham(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)<\/p>\n

Following the judgment, a GMCA spokesperson said: \u201cToday\u2019s judgment is a vindication of all the work that has gone into delivering Places for Everyone \u2013 a plan which addresses the needs of our growing city region while protecting nature and enhancing green spaces and biodiversity.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe High Court has now dismissed all five of the Claimant\u2019s legal grounds. This is testament to the diligence of the team of professionals who spent more than a decade working on this joint development plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a plan that will unlock the new homes and employment spaces our communities need, maximising the use of brownfield land and protecting Green Belt land from unplanned development.<\/p>\n

\u201cNine of our councils adopted the plan, which provides them with certainty over land supply and housing targets, mapping out shovel-ready sites so we can get on with tackling the housing crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cGreater Manchester is already bringing forward brownfield land for development across the city-region. Our \u00a3150m Brownfield Housing Fund has allocated funding to build up to 11,000 new homes, including 4,000 affordable homes. In 2023\/2024, 2,617 affordable homes were completed in Greater Manchester \u2013 the most in a single year since 1998.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday\u2019s ruling will give investors confidence to come and work with us. It will help us to ensure everyone and every place in Greater Manchester can feel the benefit of economic growth by delivering more new homes to tackle the housing crisis as well as infrastructure and jobs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Campaigners challenged the Places for Everyone plan, alleging the Greater Manchester Combined Authority \u2018erred in law\u2019Manchester has seen…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":525512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8813],"tags":[748,30,393,4884,11564,170531,2465,285,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-525511","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manchester","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-courts","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-greater-manchester-combined-authority","13":"tag-greater-manchester-spatial-framework","14":"tag-manchester","15":"tag-politics","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115431035672702298","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=525511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/525512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=525511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=525511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=525511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}