The emerging draft Local Plan Review has found it necessary to release land from the Green Belt in order to meet the Council's housing targets. Given the shortfall within the wider Housing Market Area and the potential requirement for Solihull to accommodate further dwellings within the plan period, particularly to address Birmingham's significant shortfall, it will be necessary to identify further sites for development within the Borough and further Green Belt land release is likely to be necessary.

These representations therefore promote land to the west of 227 Lugtrout Lane as suitable for residential development and it is requested that the Council consider its release from the Green Belt. The site was considered a suitable site for development which was available and achievable, scoring highly on all matters considered in the Council's SHELAA (site ref 28) and in accordance with the recent White Paper on housing, local planning authorities should be looking to allocate sites for smaller developments to meet up to 10% of their housing targets. This site would suit that purpose.

The site is currently located in Green Belt and the Local Plan Review is an appropriate place to review Green Belt boundaries to identify land to meet need, which, as discussed above, this would do. The Council's own Green Belt Study identifies the land as lower performing when considered against the objectives of including land within the Green Belt for all purposes except one, where it is considered to perform 'moderately' in preventing neighbouring towns from merging. The release of this land from the Green Belt would not result in the merging of any settlements. It is a well contained piece of land which has development surrounding it and its release would not adversely affect the role or objectives of the Green Belt.

In summary, it is evident that further land will need to be identified for housing to meet the full need, once fully identified through the Local Plan Review process and joint working, particularly with Birmingham City Council. The site promoted in these representations would assist in meeting the Solihull housing need and also the Government's direction in the White Paper stating that local planning authorities will need to provide 10% of housing targets as smaller size allocations.