In 1994 the Conservative Transport Secretary, John MacGregor, offended environmentalists by declaring that he didn’t understand the complaints about roadbuilding swallowing up the countryside because he had just taken a helicopter ride and had found motorways “incredibly hard to spot”. His Nelson moment – “I see no motorways” – was considered to be a political gaffe at the time, though it contained a truism that ought to be recognised in the current debate over Gordon Brown’s plan to increase housebuilding: that there is more of the English countryside left than we tend to think.

To listen to some of the critics of new housebuilding one might well come to the conclusion that the English countryside has been reduced to a small patch of grass somewhere between Chertsey and Woking, over which developers are already clashing in their JCBs. In fact, according to the Government’s Countryside Survey 2000, 2.3 million hectares of Britain were classified as “developed” when the survey was completed seven years ago – approximately 10 per cent of the land surface area. And of this only a small proportion was actually concreted over: the definition of developed land includes gardens, many of which are just as green and full of wildlife (in fact often more so) than the agricultural land that surrounds them.

Neither can it be said that the countryside is being swallowed up at an alarming rate: in the eight years before the survey the amount of developed land was found to have increased by 4 per cent. At the current rate of building it will take 200 years for the quantity of developed land in Britain to double.

Of course, these statistics are unlikely to pacify anyone who wakes up to find proposals for a large new housing estate on their doorstep. If the view from your living room is suddenly to be filled with a toytown of mass-produced houses, swirling cul-de-sacs and a drive-thru’ McDonald’s, you are not likely to find the concept of building more homes endearing. But then your objections will not be a function of the quantity of new housebuilding, but rather the depressing style and form of new housebuilding.

That the words “new” and “housing” strike such fear into the hearts of the average Englishman is, perversely, partly down to planning rules dreamt up to protect the countryside. In order to pacify opponents of housebuilding, local authorities have been ordered to build housing at ever-higher densities – up to 50 units per hectare. As the alleyways of auld Edinburgh demonstrate, it is possible to build housing at this kind of density and still provide aesthetic pleasure, but perhaps not in the age of the motorcar. The outcome of building at higher densities has been to make new housing developments far more urban, where virtually every inch of land is taken up either with the houses themselves or to provide hard standing for vehicles. Within developments there is precious little left for greenery.

Moreover, the rules requiring new housing to be built at high densities do not extend to commercial development – with the bizarre result that a few yards away from dense Prescott-era housing estates often lie vast supermarket car parks, drive thru’ burger bars and low-rise retail parks. It is a similar story with the target requiring 60 per cent of new homes to be built on previously developed land: there is no corresponding target for commercial development. The outcome is that houses are squashed on to the sites of old factories and offices – while the factories and offices are relocated to greenfield sites a few miles away.

If we want to preserve the British countryside, we would do better relaxing the rules on housing density and brownfield development. When done properly, and at not-too-high densities, the countryside can absorb large numbers of houses without losing its rural character. Indeed, the countryside always has contained homes for large numbers of residents: without them it would not be countryside, but wilderness.

Rather than the rules preventing any development in the countryside, we should have laws ensuring that new housing developed there does not subsume the rural character of the area. How about banning concrete and tarmac driveways from rural properties, and allowing only absorbent, gravelled surfaces? Not only would this prevent the spread of suburbia to the country, it would also reduce the amount of rainwater run-off – a growing factor in flooding.

One of the reasons that we react so strongly to the idea of fields being developed for housing is that we perceive it to be an irreversible process. But there is no reason why it should be. Rather than building on concrete footings, why aren’t we building on wooden piles?

If they are good enough for the palazzos of Venice, surely they are good enough for a cottage in Berkshire. Traditional building always did have a transitional effect in the environment: the countryside is dotted with the sites of long-demolished cottages whose earth floors, lime-plastered walls and thatched straw roofs have long since crumbled into the soil to leave virtually no trace.

That our planning system is a long way from taking into account the impact of building techniques on the environment is clear from the case of Tony Wrench and Jane Faith, who this week were ordered by the Pembrokeshire National Park Authority to demolish their single-roomed cottage. With its turf roof, straw insulation and reed-bed sewage system, the building blends into its surroundings as well as Jeremy Fisher’s hovel. But that is still not good enough for the authority, which complained that the building made no habitat provision for bats and dormice.

I am not sure I would quite want to live like Mr Wrench and Ms Faith, who have no fridge or washing machine, but I am quite sure that if building techniques were moved a little bit in the direction of their eco-home, opposition to new housebuilding in the countryside would weaken.

In fact, I suspect that neither John MacGregor nor any other frequent helicopter-flyer would notice, as they peered down on England’s lush pastures, that any houses had been built there at all.

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