A senior city planner has told a conference in Belfast that soaring house prices in Northern Ireland are no reason to abandon a green planning policy.

The Department of Environment's Belfast Planning Manager, Bill Morrison is challenging developers to come clean on house prices.

He says "escalating house prices do not indicate a housing land shortage".

This flies in the face of claims by many estate agents and developers in and around Belfast who say there is a dire shortage of building land.

But Mr Morrison maintains this isn't the case and promises tougher planning policies to protect the environment and provide sustainability.

He says too many people want to live in popular areas, just because they like the idea and have the money. It is this that has driven up prices, he claims.

But local developer Fred Frazer dismisses the argument.

He says it is simply the law of supply and demand. Developers claim there is an urgent need for more building land to be released in the Belfast Metropolitan Area.

Mr Frazer puts the blame for the shortage of land and high prices in some areas of Belfast on a lack of planning policy by government.

But Mr Morrison was unmoved by this argument.

He has told the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors "Tougher planning policies were a necessary response to escalating property values, and not a cause of them".

He warns that the planners in Northern Ireland are to get tough in the future.