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On 25 October 2011, Barry asked the Government what it is doing to encourage Local Authorities to provide more land for allotments and how long the average waiting time for an application to rent an allotment .

From speaking to his constituents in Huddersfield, Barry is concerned that there is a significant shortfall in the number of plots available.  In the current economic climate, there are not only significant financial benefits to being able to grow your own vegetables, but also there are also significant health, environmental and wider well-being related advantages.

He submitted the following written parliamentary questions and received these answers from the Department of Communities and Local Government:

What plans the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government has to encourage local authorities to provide more land for allotments.

He was told:

“The Government are working with voluntary and community sector organisations, including the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens, Allotment Regeneration Initiative and the National Society of Allotment and Leisure Gardeners to promote the importance of allotments and to encourage local authorities to make allotment land available. The Federation of City Farms have been investigating the potential for a community land advisory service to assist in the transfer of ownership and/or control of land from public or private landowners to community groups through purchase/sale or leasing. A business case is under development.

In addition, there are a number of other measures that we are taking forward, including measures in the Localism Bill, that will enable local people who are interested in food growing and cultivation to play a bigger role in planning, designing, managing and maintaining community green spaces for this purpose.

‘The Community Right to Reclaim Land’ will help communities to find space for food growing by making information about land owned by public bodies more easily available and help to ensure that under-used or unused land owned by public bodies and some other organisations is brought back into beneficial use.

Under proposals for the ‘National Planning Policy Framework’ local communities can protect the environmental and cultural landscapes they value. They will be able, through their local and neighbourhood plans, to identify, for special protection, green areas of particular significance to them. This local significance could be because of the green area’s beauty, historic importance, recreational value (including land used for allotments where it is not already protected by allotment legislation), tranquillity or richness of its wildlife. By designating land as local green space, local communities will be able to rule out new development other than in very special circumstances. Full public consultation on the draft framework was launched on 25 July and closed on 17 October.

We are also looking at whether meanwhile leases for land could be used to provide community groups with a temporary space to grow. Locality, formerly the Development Trusts Associations, has developed model leases at:

http://www.meanwhile.org.uk/useful-info/view/legal

that can be used by landowners and communities to make use of land on a temporary basis (e.g. land set aside for a specific purpose but where the land is not currently being utilised to that effect).

Alongside the “How to” guide that my Department published at the end of August, providing advice for communities interested in creating or cultivating community orchards at:

http://www.communities.gov.uk/news/newsroom/1973439

we will be developing a similar guide for individuals and communities interested in finding and developing space for food growing.

Guidance on managing existing plots better, for example, reducing plot sizes and taking action in cases where plots are not being cultivated, is available to local authorities via “A Place to Grow” available on the LGA website at:

www.lga.gov.uk/lga/publications/publication-display.do?id=9027596”

He also asked the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what the average length of time was for an application to rent an allotment in the latest period for which figures are available.

He was told:

“Records of allotment provision or the average time someone has to spend on a waiting list are not held at a national level. This is a matter for individual local authorities.

Research produced by the university of Derby in 2006, based on a partial survey of local authorities, reported that in the period 1996 to 2006, the number of allotment plots fell by 50,630. The report, commissioned but unpublished by the previous Government, was posted up on the DCLG website on 6 May at:

http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/corporate/pdf/1897047.pdf

Recent indications are however that the tide is turning. The number of allotment disposal cases has reduced significantly from 57 in 2005 to 15 last year. In addition, the National Society of Allotment and Leisure report that in certain areas of the country significant progress has been made in providing more land to meet demand for allotments, for instance, 52 new allotments sites have been created in the south west within the last year alone. Increasingly, councils are providing extra plots through bringing into use extra plots on existing sites, by extending existing sites or splitting plots in half as they become vacant to help meet demand. These practices are very much in keeping with the recommendations set out in the DCLG/Local Government Association guidance to local authorities in “A Place to Grow”, which can be found at:

www.lga.gov.uk/lga/publications/publication-display.do?id=9027596

Surveys undertaken by West Kirby Transition Town in conjunction with the National Society of Allotment and Leisure Gardeners show waiting lists for allotments have grown considerably. The latest survey results published on 6 May 2011 estimated that around 87,000 people are on waiting lists for just over 152,000 statutory plots managed by principal local authorities (not including those run by parish or town councils or allotment associations). This equates to 57 people waiting for every 100 plots. In 1996 there was an average of four people waiting for every 100 plots.

New neighbourhood planning provisions being introduced in the Localism Bill will provide communities with a means to boost the number of sites with powers to protect existing allotments and identify new plots. In addition, requirements for councils to provide allotments will be safeguarded as part of a wider review into reducing statutory burdens on local authorities.

The above information was covered in a news release issued by the Department on 7 May, available at:

www.communities.gov.uk/news/corporate/1897155”