A petition against releasing green belt farmland at Joel Street, Northwood Hills, reached 621 signatures in two days. The council's threshold is 50.

A petition asking Hillingdon Council not to release green belt farmland at Northwood Hills for housing has been signed 621 times in two days. It opened on Tuesday 18 August and runs until 18 September. The council’s threshold for formally considering a petition is 50 signatures. (Stop the development on Joel street farm, Hillingdon Council ePetitions)

That makes it comfortably the largest petition on the council’s register. Thirteen petitions are currently listed, open and finished together, and the next biggest of them has 108 signatures.

The land is Joel Street Farm Lands, off Joel Street between Northwood Hills and Eastcote. It is green belt: when the council’s North Planning Committee considered a nursery scheme on the site in October 2014, officers assessed it against “adopted Green Belt Policy” and judged the impact on “the openness of the Green Belt”, and the committee noted the locally listed buildings there. (North Planning Committee, 7 October 2014, item 71)

What the petition asks for

The wording is a request that the council “not approve the release of Land known as Joel Street Farm Lands, Northwood Hills for development in the Hillingdon Local Plan currently being drafted”. Its stated grounds are:

  • once green belt land is built on it cannot be replaced
  • the site has “a very rich level of wildlife” with mature oaks and hedges
  • habitat loss is a reason bird numbers are falling, citing the RSPB
  • the council’s own charter says it will only provide projects and services residents want

(ePetition 515, full wording)

How it compares on the register

Signature counts on Hillingdon’s ePetition register today, open and finished:

Bar chart of signature counts on Hillingdon Council's ePetition register: Joel Street Farm 621, Benbow Waye 108, Park Road 62, Cranford Lane 61, Pole Hill 55, Ash Grove 43
Joel Street Farm against the five next-largest petitions on Hillingdon's register. Source: Hillingdon Council ePetitions, read 20 August 2026. Graphic by Uxbridge News.
  • Joel Street Farm, Northwood Hills: 621 (open, closes 18 September)
  • Unauthorised building at Benbow Waye, Cowley: 108 (finished 10 August)
  • Road safety on Park Road: 62 (finished 16 August)
  • Fly-tipping cameras on Cranford Lane: 61 (open, closes 3 September)
  • Pole Hill open space path: 55 (finished 13 August)
  • 44 Ash Grove HMO objection, Harefield: 43 (finished 13 August)

Four other live or recent petitions sit below the threshold, including two asking for resident parking schemes: Birchway in Hayes on 36, and Croyde Avenue in Hayes, aimed at Heathrow holiday parking, on 9. (Hillingdon Council ePetitions)

The timing is not an accident

The petition landed three days before the council’s Local Plan scoping consultation closes, at 5pm on Friday 21 August. That is the first of three public stages in a plan that will decide where housing goes in the borough for the next 15 years, and we set out what it does and does not cover in our guide to the Local Plan consultation.

No sites are on the table yet. The council’s own housing numbers and site options appear at the next stage, the content and evidence consultation, which runs from 5 November 2026 to 14 January 2027.

What the council’s own record says

The petition argues that site selection is the council’s decision rather than the Mayor’s, and the council’s minutes back that up. Officers told the Corporate Resources and Infrastructure Select Committee on 29 July that the London Plan is the strategic plan for Greater London and Hillingdon’s Local Plan “must be in general conformity with it”, but added that “the Local Plan remained the responsibility of the Council and decisions regarding its content ultimately rested with the Council”. (Local Plan update, item 16, 29 July 2026)

Two qualifications came with that. Officers said representations would be “assessed against evidence supporting the Council’s overall strategy”, and that the finished plan goes to an independent Examination in Public where a planning inspector decides whether it is sound and evidence-based. A council can choose its sites; it cannot choose to allocate none and still pass examination.

Officers also acknowledged something the petition reflects. Asked who usually responds to planning consultations, they said these “often generated high levels of engagement from professional stakeholders and landowners with specific development interests”. A 621-signature petition from residents is the other side of that.

The petition’s separate claim about which places the Mayor’s draft London Plan names is the petitioners’ own reading of that document. The council’s public statement on the draft names no sites at all. On 30 July it said the Mayor’s draft proposes 24,030 homes in Hillingdon over ten years, more than double the current target, with 61 per cent on green belt, which it called the largest green belt allocation proposed for any London borough. Cllr Steve Tuckwell, the council’s leader, said it was “another example of the Mayor trying to dictate Hillingdon’s future from City Hall”. (Council challenges Mayor’s plan, 30 July 2026)

Residents cannot yet check which fields were put forward

The council ran a Call for Sites exercise from 26 May to 29 September 2023, and again alongside its Regulation 18 consultation from 29 April to 24 June 2024, asking landowners to nominate land with development potential. It says it “has received a number of submissions” and is “in the process of reviewing and assessing these sites”. (Call for Sites Exercise, Hillingdon Council)

Those submissions have not been published. So there is no list a resident can search to find out whether the field at the end of their road has been offered up, which is a large part of why a petition is doing the work a site register would.

What it means for you

  • The petition is at modgov.hillingdon.gov.uk and closes on 18 September. It has already passed the 50-signature threshold, so the council will formally consider it whatever happens next. The relevant Cabinet Member decides the response, which may be a written reply, a site visit, or handling it through a live consultation.
  • The Local Plan scoping consultation closes at 5pm on Friday 21 August. If you want to argue about green belt in principle, that is the open door this week, at hillingdon.gov.uk/localplanconsultation.
  • The Mayor’s draft London Plan is the bigger lever on the numbers, and it is open until 15 October. The 61 per cent green belt share is set there, not in Uxbridge.
  • To be told when the site-specific stage opens, the council asks for your name and email at localplan@hillingdon.gov.uk. That November consultation is the first time actual sites appear.
  • Planning applications and decisions across the borough are tracked on our Uxbridge planning news page.

Sources