Our purpose
Buy the land. Keep it green. Forever.
One sentence sums up why the trust exists: land that the community owns cannot be built on against the community’s wishes.
The problem
Sawbridgeworth sits in the Hertfordshire green belt, between Bishop’s Stortford and Harlow. That designation has held the town’s edges for decades, and it is the reason the fields, hedgerows and river meadows around us still look the way they do.
But green belt is a planning policy. Policies are reviewed, boundaries are redrawn, and the pressure on land at the edge of a growing town does not go away. Every local plan cycle brings the same questions back around.
Campaigning against individual proposals can win time. It cannot win permanence.
Our answer
We buy land on the open market, at a fair price, like any other buyer – and then we simply do not sell it for development. Our rules make that binding rather than a matter of goodwill.
It is an unglamorous approach. It is also the only one that still works in fifty years’ time.
Our principles
What we commit to
In perpetuity
Land we buy is held as open land permanently. Our asset lock prevents it being sold on for development or moved out of community ownership.
Community first
We exist to benefit the people of Sawbridgeworth and the surrounding parishes – not our members personally, and not any commercial interest.
Open books
We publish annual accounts, report what we have bought and what it cost, and answer members’ questions at our AGM.
Nature and access
We manage what we own for wildlife first, with public access wherever that is safe and compatible with the habitat.
Fair dealing
We negotiate openly with landowners and pay market value. We are a buyer, not a campaign group aimed at any individual.
Politically independent
We work with anyone who shares the aim and take no party position. We do not comment on individual planning applications.
What protection actually means
When people hear “protected land” they often assume a legal designation somewhere in a council file. Ours is simpler and stronger:
- Title. The society is the registered owner at the Land Registry.
- Asset lock. Our registered rules prevent the land leaving community ownership.
- Members. Any change of direction needs a members’ vote, not a committee decision.
Nothing here depends on a future council, a future government, or a future local plan.
Turn a policy into a promise
Every membership and every donation adds to the fund we draw on when land comes up for sale.