Supplementary memorandum submitted by
the Department for Communities and Local Government (formerly
the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister)
Question 48 (Greg Clerk): Estimated trends relating
to green space
Accurate and comparable data on urban green
spaces to enable trends to be established has not been available
in the past. Therefore the Department is developing a green space
database for England which will share data about a range of publicly-accessible
green spaces (including parks, allotments, playing fields, cemeteries,
consistent with the PPG17 typology as far as possible), through
a map-based internet tool. This is the first step towards a comprehensive,
co-ordinated and consistent base-line that planners and managers
of green spaces can use for their green-space audits and assessments.
The Department and other Government bodies already
collect data on a variety of green spaces, including parks, cemeteries
and burial grounds, allotments, community gardens, playing fields,
woodlands, nature reserves. By combining and sharing this data
we will be able to build a more detailed picture of the different
types of green spaces throughout England and avoid duplication
of effort and add value to existing data sets. The Department
will be piloting green space data, via the Maps on Tap tool, with
key green space stakeholders shortly.
Question 61 (Greg Clark): Information relating
to private gardens
A snapshot of green spaces (England-wide) in
2001 is available through the Generalised Land Use Database. This
category covers all types of green spaces including privately
owned, public spaces, rural and agricultural land. GLUD 2001 also
provides a measure of the quantity of residential gardens. In
2001 there was approximately 116,044 kilometres squared of green
space and 5,472 kilometres squared of domestic gardens in England
(source: Generalised land use database 2001, DCLG). GLUD 2005
data is due later in 2006, which should enable some tracking trends
in the gross amount of green space and gardens over time. The
Department's Generalised Land Use Database (GLUD) will form the
foundation of the map described above.
The Department records amounts of land use change
in its Land Use Change Statistics. The most recent results (available
on Department's website) show that in 2004 22% of the new housing
on previously-developed land was on land that was previously residential.
Some of this will have involved the replacement of existing dwellings
or the addition of extra storeys. The extent of garden space lost
is not known. The change would be recorded as from Residential
to Residential, private gardens being counted as residential land
and not as green space. A further update will be published at
the end of May as Land Use Change in England: Residential Development
to 2005.
Question 92 (Helen Goodman): PPG 17 and children
There is no specific obligation to consult children,
but Planning Policy Guidance note 17—Open Space, Sport and
Recreation (PPG17) is clear that assessments of need should cover
the differing and distinctive needs of the population of their
area and the Companion guide gives good practice guidance on ensuring
that the needs of children and young people are fully taken into
account in the audit and assessment process.
PPG17 also presents an open space typology,
based on the work of the Urban Green Spaces Taskforce. This includes
a category for provision for children and teenagers—including
play areas, skateboard parks, outdoor basketball hoops, and other
more informal areas (e.g. teen-shelters).
The Companion Guide to PPG17—Assessing
Needs and Opportunities suggests that a steering group for the
assessment process should normally include a representative of
local children's play interests and young people generally. It
also advises that work on the preparation of planning policies
and provision standards for open space should draw on existing
local strategies, including children's play strategies. Finally,
it promotes the Children's Play Council and National Children's
Bureau guide to planning for outdoor play, which recommends an
approach based on identifying the needs, wishes and entitlements
of children and young people.
In preparing the local development documents
which form part of the Local Development Framework, local planning
authorities are required to engage with the community in accordance
with their statements of community involvement. The statement
of community involvement sets out the standards to be achieved
by the local authority in involving the community in the preparation,
alteration and continuing review of all local development documents
and planning applications. In particular, the statement of community
involvement should set out how the authority will engage with
different target audiences and how innovative techniques could
be developed to involve traditionally "hard to reach"
groups such as young people.
Question 93 (Helen Goodman): Audit of children's
play provision
There is no nationally collected data on play
areas for children and young people. However, in the next two
years the Big Lottery Fund will be distributing funding for play
areas to every district and unitary authorities in England, including
for developing of play strategies, which is likely to include
an audit of existing children's play provision. We will attempt
to capture any data on outdoor public play areas within the green
space database.
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