Category: Politics

The Blob

Do you feel seen?

Kemi Badenoch, the Tories’ new leader, plans war on the “blob” (The Economist, 2 November 2024).

The piece spurred me to read her pamphlet, Conservatism in Crisis: Rise of the Bureaucratic Class  (30 September 2024). Friends, we are the bureaucratic class and we are directly in its sights. And it’s not a wholly unfair challenge.

From her foreword (my emboldening):

“In nearly every country, a new progressive ideology is on the rise. This ideology is based on the twin pillars of constant intervention on behalf of protecting marginalised, vulnerable groups, including protecting us from ourselves – and the idea that bureaucrats make better decisions than individuals, or even democratic nation states.

This ideology is behind the rise of identity politics, the attacks on the democratic, sovereign nation state, and ever- more government via spending and regulation. It is driving the economic slowdown seen across the West and social polarisation in country after country. A new left, not based primarily on nationalisation and private sector trade unions, but ever increasing social and economic control.

A new class of people, a new and growing bureaucratic class, is driving these changes. More and more jobs are related not to providing goods and services in the marketplace, but are instead focused around administering government rules.

Often these jobs are in private sector bureaucracies, confounding the old split between the public and private sectors.

This pamphlet discusses some of them – and how there is a world of difference, for example, between a lawyer dealing with market contracts and one focused on compliance, human rights or environmental laws. Between the market- focused HR staff fixing pensions and finding the best talent and those dealing with the ever- expanding EDI sector or imposing ever tighter control over employees’ lives, changes driven often by government rules.  The growth of pointless degrees pushed by government so that a middle- class job requires a major millstone of debt, funding a growing university administrative class.”

“We recently saw an excellent paper, Foundations, which built on the strong work by the group Britain Remade, listing the tens of thousands of pages of paperwork required to build infrastructure, holding back our economy. I met with this team as a Secretary of State and explained the challenges I faced were often with fellow Conservatives afraid to challenge the consensus.

Whenever you try to roll back the environmental laws, the diversity and social requirements, to trim the judicial reviews and the fake consultation processes, too many in our party are nowhere to be seen. This is thus not a process problem, but a political problem.

Too many in our party think that the bureaucratic class and their demands should not be confronted, and they are not prepared to make the trade- offs we need in order to get our economy moving again.“

From the executive summary:

“Increasing numbers of middle- class jobs relate more to government rules than goods and services bought and sold in the market. This close relationship with government and regulation creates a different economic, social, cultural and political reality for much of the urban middle class in the UK and wider West.  A lawyer dealing in market contracts between two private sector firms is very different to one dealing in HR, sustainability, compliance etc.”

“Across the West we are moving to a structure of politics that is horizontal – where how you earn your money is as important as how much money you earn. Instead of a vertical political structure, there is now a horizontal political structure.”

“The bureaucratic class benefit from more government, not less government. If you work in a job where you are largely about protecting people in some sense, if your role is derived from the sprawling mass of government regulation, then you will lean toward more government.”

“Expanding regulation is seen in area after area. The legal profession has also grown very sharply as the size of government has grown. From 1971 to the present there has been an over a sevenfold increase in numbers, versus a 200% increase in GDP. Only 10% of the UK’s legal profession’s earnings are related to legal exports. This mirrors the USA, where per head the legal profession largely grew at the rate of the population, but took off toward the end of the 20th century and close to tripled.  New specialisms, such as environmental law, human rights law, human resources and discrimination law, immigration and refugee law are now whole careers in themselves.”

“Here in the UK, statutory instruments, legislation that sits underneath Acts of Parliament, rose from a few thousand in the initial postwar period to well over 10,000 by the late 00s and 2010s. The bureaucratic class has a clear economic cost. But even more importantly, there can be no reform of the public or private sector while the bureaucratic class dominates.

The bureaucratic class cannot fix anything because it always starts from the wrong place.

Bureaucratic class answers are always the same. They always involve more regulation and control over ordinary people – expanding the power and scope of the bureaucratic class – rather than streamlining the public sector and giving more power to public sector users. This drives weak public sector productivity, growing at just 0.2% a year over the past few decades.”

“For example, UK building regulations are now 1,500 pages, despite the misleading and dishonest arguments that the sector is ‘deregulated’. Indeed, the complexity now acts to make the limited genuine requirements (e.g. protecting us from unsafe cladding) obscured in a thicket of wider regulations.

Often the creation of a compliance industry just expands the bureaucratic class. Likewise, the growth of a massive planning bureaucracy has not improved the quality or quantity of what we build, but it has meant bureaucratic class jobs.”

Her conclusions?

“The Conservatives have to realise the bureaucratic class and the new progressive ideology are their opponents. The idea that as Labour fails, then simply because someone has a comfortable middle- class job they will come back to voting for the right is false.

There will have to be a new type of politics. To take on the bureaucratic class means to ditch radical environmental politics, unpick identity politics, focus on a strong positive national identity, limit migration, reduce the endless HR, compliance and sustainability rules, to streamline planning, to focus on bringing down the cost of the welfare state and much more.”

It has an echo of Project 2025 doesn’t it? Many of you, frustrated by ever more onerous regulation, longer timescales, the need to appoint ever increasing numbers of “experts“, the burden of regulatory compliance procedures, will find this an attractive diagnosis. What is our response?

There is a simple response: how do we streamline planning, for example, whilst not harming the quality or quantity of what we build or the environmental and social protections we expect? If we can, let’s do it. My inner concern is whether this response will continue to be enough.

The dilemmas are all around us, all of the time.

Exhibit 1: The topic I covered in last week’s blog post, Banner Review Into Legal Challenges of NSIPs. We all want to simplify processes surely, but how? Many of the time it’s not the so-called bureaucratic class (i.e. me and my cosy friends – you lot) standing in the way – it’s people: voters; local politicians; volunteers.

Exhibit 2: the House of Lords Built Environment Committee’s current inquiry into Labour’s “grey belt” proposal. I gave evidence to it as the only lawyer or indeed private sector advisor. I had heard much hand wringing from some as to how the proposal is too uncertain in its drafting and is therefore likely to lead to endless litigation, that it is all hopelessly vague, that the release of land from the green belt should be a matter for local planning authorities by way of local plans. How come I, as a card-carrying member of Kemi Badenoch’s supposed bureaucratic class was the one pushing back (see the draft transcript of my evidence): to deliver on the government’s housing and growth objectives it will need to make changes like these; there will not be endless litigation; simple definitions are fine – in fact the dangers lie with complexity. Oh for the days of the 1955 green belt circular – three pages or so, no consultation, no angst as to what “very special circumstances” (for instance) actually might mean. We all surely are in this fix with every intended piece of policy or legislation: do we aim for complex, comprehensively drafted solutions, covering every permutation of outcome or is something simpler, more broadly stated, ever to be preferred if it can have an immediate effect (and avoid the additional risks of ambiguity that come with complexity)?

Exhibit 3: Labour’s planning reforms more generally and my view as to the greatest danger that they face: the risk of being neutralised, as so many reform proposals previously have been: by endless consultation processes; processes to review the outcome of those consultation processes, and consultation processes to drill down to the next detailed stage, by which time the world has moved on and yes the moment has gone again.

Paul Smith of the Strategic Land Group spotted the following references to the government’s planning reforms in the Office of Budget Responsibility’s economic and fiscal outlook paper published  alongside the budget on 30 October 2024. Its assessment of current policy risks includes this:

“The Government has proposed significant changes to the National Planning Policy Framework as part of wider reforms to the planning system. These changes are yet to be finalised, as responses to a recent public consultation are being processed by the Government. As such, there is insufficient certainty to adjust our current forecast for these measures and we will continue to monitor developments, especially around their implementation given past reform attempts, to judge if and when to incorporate them. These reforms may enable greater delivery of new housing and infrastructure projects, which would boost the associated investment flows, as well as increasing productivity over the longer term.”

I would agree with the passage that I have emboldened. Incidentally, it’s interesting to see that the OBR’s overall assessment as to likely net additions for the five years to 2029-2030 is relatively upbeat:

“We forecast property transactions to rise from around 275,000 a quarter in 2024 to around 350,000 a quarter over the forecast. Property transactions rose by around 10 per cent over the first half of 2024, 8 percentage points higher than we had anticipated in March. Compared to our March forecast, property transactions are therefore higher in the short term but marginally lower in the medium term, reflecting our forecast for fewer net additions to the housing stock, which reduces supply. We expect housing starts, a leading indicator of net additions to the housing stock, to gradually pick up from a decade-low of around 100,000 in 2024 to reach around 160,000 in 2029. Cumulatively over the forecast, net additions are around 1.3 million. The Government has proposed significant changes to the National Planning Policy Framework as part of wider reforms to the planning system, which represent an upside risk to our housing supply forecast.”

Will Kemi Badenoch lead a resurgent Conservative party to victory in 2029? I would say that this partly depends upon whether the current government does manage to push on through with its planning reforms and whether house building numbers do start to increase to, if not its target of 1.5m homes within this Parliamentary term, then to at least that OBR projection.

In the meantime Kemi, maybe I’ll retrain as something more useful, like a contracts lawyer. (What??!!).

Simon Ricketts, 3 November 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Grenfell Tower Inquiry Report Phase 2: What Implications For The Planning System?

The inquiry’s recommendations are within volume 7, part 14, chapter 113, pages 231 to 249 of its phase 2 report published on 4 September 2024, following publication of its phase 1 report in 2019. After 1,500 or so pages, the recommendations are expressed concisely, with precision and urgency.

The question for this phase of the inquiry to answer was specific:

“In Phase 2 we have set out to answer the question that has been at the forefront of many people’s minds: how was it possible in 21st century London for a reinforced concrete building, itself structurally impervious to fire, to be turned into a death trap that would enable fire to sweep through it in an uncontrollable way in a matter of a few hours despite what were thought to be effective regulations designed to prevent just such an event?”

The conclusions of the report lay bare the tangle of causes:

There is no simple answer to that question, but in this report we identify the many failings of a wide range of institutions, entities and individuals over many years that together brought about that situation.”

These pieces in Inside Housing, ‘Complacent’ government ‘well aware’ of cladding risks before Grenfell fire but ‘failed to act’ and What the Grenfell Tower Inquiry report said about the key players in the disaster draw together those conclusions.

With some humility given the seriousness of the topic and its breadth, I thought that I should at least try to identify some potential consequences for the planning system. This follows two earlier blog posts, Tall Buildings & Fire Safety (7 January 2023) and Safety & Planning (3 July 2021). Themes of those posts included the extent to which human safety, and the safe construction of buildings, are a matter for the planning system rather than Building Regulations and the problems arising where policies are continually in a state of flux, when there is uncertainty as to where the controls lie – via the planning system or via separate legislation – and when there is the possibility of inconsistency as between the differing regimes.

Partly as a response to phase 1 of the inquiry’s work, the previous Government made the Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure and Section 62A Applications) (England) (Amendment) Order 2021, which introduced a requirement for a fire statement to be submitted with applications for planning permission for development involving a building (1) contains two or more dwellings or educational accommodation and (2) contains 7 or more storeys or is 18 metres or more in height. This “Planning Gateway One” fire statement is published on the planning register and the Health and Safety Executive must consulted before the grant of planning permission involving a high-rise residential building in certain circumstances.

The Planning Practice Guidance explains:

“The changes are intended to help ensure that applicants and decision-makers consider planning issues relevant to fire safety, bringing forward thinking on fire safety matters as they relate to land use planning to the earliest possible stage in the development process and result in better schemes which fully integrate thinking on fire safety.”

Against that context, let’s look at some of the phase 2 report recommendations most relevant to the Town and Country Planning Act system. On a narrow reading, the recommendations focus on the need for improvements to the separate Building Regulations/”building control” system, rather than the planning system (although note my comments later):

  • The Building Regulations system as at the time of the disaster was “seriously deficient” – poorly worded, lack of active monitoring of their performance by Government.
  • The arrangements under which the construction industry are regulated have become too complex and fragmented, as between different government departments, but also: “Building control was partly in the hands of local authorities and partly in the hands of approved inspectors operating as commercial organisations, enforcement of the law relating to the sale of construction products was carried out by Trading Standards and commercial organisations provided testing and certification services to manufacturers of products. UKAS accredited organisations operating as conformity assessment bodies. In our view, this degree of fragmentation was a recipe for inefficiency and an obstacle to effective regulation.”

“In our view all the functions to which we have referred, as well as some others to which we refer below, should be exercised by a single independent body headed by a person whom, for the sake of convenience, we shall call a construction regulator, reporting to a single Secretary of State.”

“We are aware that in the period since the Grenfell Tower fire Parliament has passed the Building Safety Act 2022 to regulate work on higher-risk buildings, to impose particular duties on those involved in the construction and refurbishment of such buildings and to establish a Building Safety Regulator responsible for building control and for overseeing standards of competence. However, responsibility for the range of functions identified above remains dispersed. We therefore recommend that the government draw together under a single regulator all the functions relating to the construction industry to which we have referred.”

  • “For the purpose of this and our other recommendations we have used the expression “higher-risk building” in the sense in which it is used in the Building Safety Act, that is, a building that is at least 18 metres in height (or has at least seven storeys) and contains at least two residential units. However, we do not think that to define a building as “higher-risk” by reference only to its height is satisfactory, being essentially arbitrary in nature. More relevant is the nature of its use and, in particular, the likely presence of vulnerable people, for whom evacuation in the event of a fire or other emergency would be likely to present difficulty. We therefore recommend that the definition of a higher-risk building for the purposes of the Building Safety Act be reviewed urgently.” [my emboldening]
  • “We think that a fresh approach needs to be taken to reviewing and revising the Building Regulations and statutory guidance that is driven primarily by considerations of safety. Fresh minds are needed. We therefore recommend that, as far as possible, membership of bodies advising on changes to the statutory guidance should include representatives of the academic community as well as those with practical experience of the industry (including fire engineers) chosen for their experience and skill and should extend beyond those who have served on similar bodies in the past.”
  • “We […] recommend that it be made a statutory requirement that a fire safety strategy produced by a registered fire engineer (see below) to be submitted with building control applications (at Gateway 2) for the construction or refurbishment of any higher-risk building and for it to be reviewed and re-submitted at the stage of completion (Gateway 3). Such a strategy must take into account the needs of vulnerable people, including the additional time they may require to leave the building or reach a place of safety within it and any additional facilities necessary to ensure their safety.”
  • “We […] recommend that the profession of fire engineer be recognised and protected by law and that an independent body be established to regulate the profession, define the standards required for membership, maintain a register of members and regulate their conduct. In order to speed up the creation of a body of professional fire engineers we also recommend that the government take urgent steps to increase the number of places on high-quality masters level courses in fire engineering accredited by the professional regulator.”
  • “We recognise that both the Architects Registration Board and the Royal Institute of British Architects have taken steps since the Grenfell Tower fire to improve the education and training of architects. We recommend that they should review the changes already made to ensure they are sufficient in the light of our findings.

We also recommend that it be made a statutory requirement that an application for building control approval in relation to the construction or refurbishment of a higher-risk building (Gateway 2) be supported by a statement from a senior manager of the principal designer under the Building Safety Act 2022 that all reasonable steps have been taken to ensure that on completion the building as designed will be as safe as is required by the Building Regulations.”

  • “We […] recommend that a licensing scheme operated by the construction regulator be introduced for principal contractors wishing to undertake the construction or refurbishment of higher-risk buildings and that it be a legal requirement that any application for building control approval for the construction or refurbishment of a higher-risk building (Gateway 2) be supported by a personal undertaking from a director or senior manager of the principal contractor to take all reasonable care to ensure that on completion and handover the building is as safe as is required by the Building Regulations.”
  • “One of the causes of the inappropriate relationship to which we have referred was the introduction into the system of commercial interests. Approved inspectors had a commercial interest in acquiring and retaining customers that conflicted with the performance of their role as guardians of the public interest. Competition for work between approved inspectors and local authority building control departments introduced a similar conflict of interest affecting them. As things stand that underlying conflict of interest will continue to exist and will continue to threaten the integrity of the system. We therefore recommend that the government appoint an independent panel to consider whether it is in the public interest for building control functions to be performed by those who have a commercial interest in the process.

The shortcomings we have identified in local authority building control suggest that in the interests of professionalism and consistency of service all building control functions, including those currently performed by local authorities, should be exercised nationally. Accordingly, we recommend that the same panel consider whether all building control functions should be performed by a national authority.”

The implications for the planning system of the conclusions and recommendations of the report should not be under-estimated:

  • The Grenfell Tower tragedy had a specific factual background: the building had been constructed long ago – the issues arose through its refurbishment. Whilst building control should be the mechanism for ensuring the safety of the works carried out, the position is more complex in the case of the proposed construction in the first place of a higher-risk building. Building control is ultimately the detailed mechanism for ensuring that the development constructed can be safely occupied, but, as recognised by the Government in introducing the Planning Gateway One stage, fire safety needs to be considered at an early stage in the gestation of development proposals – it is too late for effective influence over issues such as emergency escape routes at the building control stage, there does need to be that early opportunity for safety to be built in from the outset. How are we likely to see that Planning Gateway One process change in the light of the recommendations? Clearly there will need to be some consideration as to whether 18 metres should still be the threshold. And what will the single regulator be, which responds at this stage? Will its decision-making be final or one consultation response of potentially many (albeit of significant weight)? How can we make sure that its decision-making is predictable and timely? This is also delicate to say given the potential consequences of a wrong decision, but: what if its decision-making is at times unreasonably prescriptive?
  • How will this changed approach flow through into private sector appetite to embark on multi-storey residential projects, on which any achievement of the new Government’s targeted housing numbers is predicated?
  • In circumstances where registered providers are generally reluctant to take on section 106 affordable housing (see eg The challenges for affordable housing delivery in London (Savills, 27 August 2024)), to what extent will the continuing focus on remedying existing unsafe buildings serve to increase that reluctance?
  • Are there the resources? Anecdotally there is already a lack of fire engineers to advise appropriately on projects. How much will it cost to have a properly staffed and experienced national body for building control and how to move to such as system without creating further uncertainty?

When taken with other recent or current public inquiries, such as the Infected Blood Inquiry and the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry, aside from the frustratingly long time it takes for the wheels of justice to turn, the themes arising appear to be depressingly recurring: individual greed or complacency; business objectives that have become disconnected from the public interest; how difficult it is to stand up to “the establishment” in its varying forms; inadequate often confusing or ineffective regulatory or administrative systems; ineffective agencies, and inadequate checks and balances on ministers’ actions (and inactions).

My respect goes out not just to Sir Martin Moore-Bick, Ali Akbor OBE and Thouria Istephan for their important work in relation to the Grenfell Tower Inquiry, but to all those affected by the tragedy, many of whose testimonies form such an important part of the reports. It will all unfortunately be forever part of this country’s history. It needs also to shape the future.

Simon Ricketts, 7 September 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Hope/No Hope

I know, it’s the hope that kills you. We still await any real detail as to the new government’s proposed reforms of the planning system, despite the King’s Speech and background briefing paper (17 July 2024) and despite newspaper headlines, TV news vox pops and much earnest speculation from many of us. But it’s early days and we should be patient.

In this post I just want to focus on the proposed reforms to compulsory purchase compensation which would in some cases remove the ability of landowners to recover “hope value”.

We know that there will be a Planning and Infrastructure Bill. We do not know anything more as to its likely contents than is set out on pages 17 to 19 of the background briefing document. It is intended to “accelerate housebuilding and infrastructure delivery” by:

  • streamlining the delivery process for critical infrastructure including accelerating upgrades to the national grid and boosting renewable energy, which will benefit local communities, unlock delivery of our 2030 clean power mission and net zero obligations, and secure domestic energy security. We will simplify the consenting process for major infrastructure projects and enable relevant, new and improved National Policy Statements to come forward, establishing a review process that provides the opportunity for them to be updated every five years, giving increased certainty to developers and communities.
  • further reforming compulsory purchase compensation rules to ensure that compensation paid to landowners is fair but not excessive where important social and physical infrastructure and affordable housing are being delivered. The reforms will help unlock more sites for development, enabling more effective land assembly, and in doing so speeding up housebuilding and delivering more affordable housing, supporting the public interest.
  • improving local planning decision making by modernising planning committees.
  • increasing local planning authorities’ capacity, to improve performance and decision making, providing a more predictable service to developers and investors.
  • using development to fund nature recovery where currently both are stalled, unlocking a win-win outcome for the economy and for nature, because we know we can do better than the status quo. Our commitment to the environment is unwavering, which is why the Government will work with nature delivery organisations, stakeholders and the sector over the summer to determine the best way forward. We will only act in legislation where we can confirm to Parliament that the steps we are taking will deliver positive environmental outcomes. Where we can demonstrate this, the Bill will deliver any necessary changes.”

All we are told so far about reform of compulsory purchase compensation is in that second bullet point. But of course, the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 already goes some way in this direction. Section 190 (“power to require prospects of planning permission to be ignored”) amended the Land Compensation Act 1961 to enable an acquiring authority, when submitting a compulsory purchase order for confirmation, to include a direction that the prospect of planning permission is to be ignored where the underlying project will deliver the provision of a specified number of affordable housing units. If the acquiring authority does not deliver the scheme it promised (including the provision of specific numbers of affordable housing units) within 10 years of the issuing of the original direction, or earlier where there is no realistic prospect that the scheme can be delivered within 10 years, affected landowners may ask the Secretary of State (or the Welsh Ministers for CPOs in Wales) to issue a direction that additional compensation may be paid to them by the local authority. The Act also provides for an equivalent mechanism in relation to some CPOs for NHS purposes or educational purposes. These provisions all came into force on 30 April 2024. (How did a Conservative government arrive at this incursion into the traditional compulsory purchase principle of “equivalence”? See eg my 11 June 2022 blog post Land Value Capture Via CPO which tracks the proposal back to at least the Conservative May 2017 manifesto and for a deeper historical dive into the vexed issue of land value capture I recommend Richard Harwood KC’s brilliant paper delivered to the Compulsory Purchase Association in April 2018, Land Value Capture).

So how might the new government go further? The Labour manifesto simply said “We will take steps to ensure that for specific types of development schemes, landowners are awarded fair compensation rather than inflated prices based on the prospect of planning permission”. It seems to me that the government has deliberately left itself the scope to widen the categories of CPO for which compensation can exclude any element of land value attributable to the prospect of “no scheme world” development. The Planning and Infrastructure Bill would be a straight-forward vehicle to achieve this, by amendment of section 190 of the 2023 Act.

“Fairness” is of course a loaded word, going to the heart of the political as well as practical issues which land value capture inevitably gives rise to. To what extent should the state be able to take land without paying the owner what that land is worth in the open market? The nuanced answer to that question probably lies in the wording of the European Convention on Human Rights. The right to respect for private and family life and our home is qualified: “except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.” The right not to be deprived of our possessions is similarly qualified: “except in the public interest and subject to the conditions provided for by law and by the general principles of international law.” And the state has the right to “enforce such laws as it deems necessary to control the use of property in accordance with the general interest or to secure the payment of taxes or other contributions or penalties.”

I can see that the “public interest” argument can be made in relation to affordable housing, the NHS and schools (although of course it is still at root a political decision to fund these projects in part via land value capture rather than by way of public spending paid for by other taxation measures). It will be interesting to see how much further the new government looks to go. New towns? Green Belt? Shrugged shoulders emoji.

Aside from the politics (which are beyond my pay grade), there are the practical issues (which are well within it). How will the spectre of compulsory acquisition of land, for less than what in the real world it is worth, influence the strategies of the participants? Will developers look to work pro-actively with local authorities to explore the potential for using the mechanism to achieve viable projects? Will land owners and promoters be discouraged from early land promotion activity for fear that the value gains they achieve will not be realised by them? Will processes become even more contentious given even higher stakes, particularly where land owners can show that they can bring forward development without the need for exercise for exercise by the local authority of its compulsory purchase powers?

All should be clearer before too long – at least, here’s hoping.

Simon Ricketts, 21 July 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Extract, courtesy Wikipedia, from Shepard Fairey’s Barack Obama 2008 electoral campaign poster, featuring the word “hope“.

Not Bad For A First Day At Work

That Rachel Reeves speech today (8 July 2024) is here in full. The key passages in relation to planning reform:

“Nowhere is decisive reform needed more urgently than in the case of our planning system.

Planning reform has become a byword for political timidity in the face of vested interests and a graveyard of economic ambition.

Our antiquated planning system leaves too many important projects getting tied up in years and years of red tape before shovels ever get into the ground.

We promised to put planning reform at the centre of our political argument – and we did.

We said we would grasp the nettle of planning reform – and we are doing so.

Today I can tell you that work is underway.

Over the weekend, I met with the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister to agree the urgent action needed to fix our planning system.

Today, alongside the Deputy Prime Minister, I am taking immediate action to deliver this [political content removed] government’s mission to kickstart economic growth;

And to take the urgent steps necessary to build the infrastructure that we need, including one and a half million homes over the next five years.

The system needs a new signal. This is that signal.

First, we will reform the National Planning Policy Framework, consulting on a new growth-focused approach to the planning system before the end of the month, including restoring mandatory housing targets.

And, as of today, we are ending the absurd ban on new onshore wind in England. We will also go further and consult on bringing onshore wind back into the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects regime, meaning decisions on large developments will be taken nationally not locally.

Second, we will give priority to energy projects in the system to ensure they make swift progress…

… and we will build on the spatial plan for Energy by expanding this to other infrastructure sectors. 

Third, we will create a new taskforce to accelerate stalled housing sites in our country…

…beginning with Liverpool Central Docks, Worcester Parkway, Northstowe and Langley Sutton Coldfield, representing more than 14,000 homes.

Fourth, we will also support local authorities with 300 additional planning officers across the country.

Fifth, if we are to put growth at the centre of our planning system, that means changes not only to the system itself, but to the way that ministers use our powers for direct intervention.

The Deputy Prime Minister has said that when she intervenes in the economic planning system, the benefit of development will be a central consideration and that she will not hesitate to review an application where the potential gain for the regional and national economies warrant it.

… and I welcome her decision to recover two planning appeals already, for data centres in Buckinghamshire and in Hertfordshire.

To facilitate this new approach, the Deputy Prime Minister will also write to local mayors and the Office for Investment to ensure that any investment opportunity with important planning considerations that comes across their desks is brought to her attention and also to mine.

The Deputy Prime Minister will also write to Local Planning Authorities alongside the National Planning Policy Framework consultation, making clear what will now be expected of them…

…including universal coverage of local plans, and reviews of greenbelt boundaries. These will prioritise Brownfield and grey belt land for development to meet housing targets where needed.

And our golden rules will make sure the development this frees up will allow us to deliver thousands of the affordable homes too, including more for social rent.

Sixth, as well as unlocking new housing, we will also reform the planning system to deliver the infrastructure that our country needs.

Together, [political content removed] we will ask the Secretaries of State for Transport and Energy Security and Net Zero to prioritise decisions on infrastructure projects that have been sitting unresolved for far too long.

And finally, we will set out new policy intentions for critical infrastructure in the coming months, ahead of updating relevant National Policy Statements within the year.

I know that there will be opposition to this.

I’m not naïve to that;

And we must acknowledge that trade offs always exist: any development may have environmental consequences, place pressure on services, and rouse voices of local opposition.

But we will not succumb to a status quo which responds to the existence of trade-offs by always saying no, and relegates the national interest below other priorities.”

That reference to “ending the absurd ban on new onshore wind in England” has been given effect by a DLUHC policy statement on onshore wind (8 July 2024), removing – with immediate effect – the additional tests that have applied to on-shore wind as opposed to other energy proposals, namely that the proposal has policy and community support.

Simon Ricketts, 8 July 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Courtesy Nik via Unsplash

Coded Hints As To Labour’s New Towns Thinking

Shadow Secretary of State Angela Rayner’s speech at UKREiif in Leeds on 21 May 2024 was interesting, particularly on new settlements. I have emboldened some key passages below:

“New Settlements

And while we work with the grain of local communities and their character, we’ll also consider how urban regeneration and extension can play their part.

We want homes on these sites within the first term of a Labour government.

But these new large settlements must be built in the right place, in partnership with local people.

This is why an expert independent taskforce will be set up to help choose the right sites and a list of projects will be announced within our first 12 months of government, so we can start building the towns of the future within months, not decades.

Our next generation of New Towns will build homes fit for the future. Creating places where people want to live. Inspired by garden suburbs like Hale in Manchester, Roundhay in Leeds, and the Garden City project

But let me be clear – I will not simply demand “more units, at any cost”.

The reason many local communities resist new homes is often because the housing is of the wrong type, in the wrong place – it doesn’t come with the schools, GP surgeries and green spaces that make communities, not just streets.

Or the affordable and social housing local people need.

Our next generation of New Towns will build homes fit for the future. Creating places where people want to live. Inspired by garden suburbs like Hale in Manchester, Roundhay in Leeds, and the Garden City project.

We will set out a New Towns Code – criteria that developers must meet in these new settlements:

More social and affordable homes – with a gold standard aim of 40%

Buildings with character, in tree-lined streets that fit in with nearby areas

Design that pays attention to local history and identity

Planning fit for the future, with good links to town and city centres

Guaranteed public transport and public services, from doctors’ surgeries to schools

And access to nature, parks, and places for children to play “

New Towns are just one way we get good quality, affordable houses built in the national interest.

Our local housing recovery plan will reverse the Conservatives’ damaging changes to planning, getting stalled sites moving at speed.

We’ll give Mayors the tools they need to deliver homes in their areas, revitalising brownfield first, unlocking ugly, disused grey belt land for housebuilding and setting tough new conditions for releasing that land.

Our ‘golden rules’ will ensure any grey belt development delivers affordable homes, new public services, and improved green spaces.

This means more social and affordable homes and we will ensure that brownfield sites are approved quicker so homes get built fast.

Together, we will unleash the biggest wave of affordable and social housing in a generation.

Because a safe, secure, affordable home is the foundation of a good life.

We can see the consequences when that foundation is taken away.

Today, there is an epidemic of homelessness and rough sleeping in Britain.”

Some intriguing aspects here that go beyond the Labour Party’s Plan to Power-Up Britain that I covered in my 13 April 2024 blog post Powering Up Britain  and beyond Sir Keir Starmer’s party conference speech in October 2023 (see 10 October 2023 BBC piece Keir Starmer promises to build new towns and 1.5m homes). Particularly intriguing that “an expert independent taskforce will be set up to help choose the right sites and a list of projects will be announced within our first 12 months of government, so we can start building the towns of the future within months, not decades.”.

The huge question will be how to avoid previous governments’ false starts and missteps. The last Labour government’s eco-towns programme was similarly ambitious, with preferred sites arrived at on the basis of criteria set out in a prospectus which became hotly contested by those whose sites were not selected and by local campaigners. A High Court challenge to the process failed but, given time slippages, the programme was ultimately overtaken by the 2010 General Election. The judgment in the case, Bard Campaign v Secretary of State (Walker J, 25 February 2009) makes for interesting reading as to the context. For a wider piece setting out subsequent proposals by the present government for “locally-led” new towns see my 11 July 2020 blog post The New Towns Question (Again) .

Full marks for ambition but how to balance speedy top-down decisions as to quantum, potential locations, scale and so on (however “independent” “expert” led) with ensuring that (1) there is a joined up plan to deliver the necessary infrastructure (2) schemes have sufficient local buy-in (3) schemes are commercially viable (4) there is a fit-for-purpose consenting process if building is to start “within months” (polite cough) and (5) all legal trip hazards in terms of, for instance adequate assessment and consultation can successfully be navigated? Those will be some of the questions.

And the “gold standard aim of 40%”  affordable housing is an interesting political phrase!

Simon Ricketts, 25 May 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Planning: Pre-Election Period Guidance

This will be this blog’s third general election and may result in its seventh prime minister.

The Cabinet Office today published its General Election Guidance 2024 (23 May 2024), its guidelines as to what activities should and should not be undertaken by ministers,  civil servants and non-departmental public bodies during the pre-election period to 4 July 2024, following the Prime Minister’s announcement yesterday. It comes into effect on 25 May 2024.

For commentary as to the implications for decision making on planning matters, at national and local levels, see my 1 November 2019 blog post Dial P For Purdah.

The Planning Inspectorate has also today (23 May 2024) published its approach to casework during the pre-election period 2024 . Key passages:

“The Planning Inspectorate always aims to issue decisions and recommendations promptly.  However, in the run-up to the General Election we are concerned to ensure that decisions or recommendations relating to proposals which have raised sensitivities or interest in an area cannot be deemed to have influenced the election in any constituency or, more broadly, across the country, or have been used to electoral advantage by any interested body. 

Whether a decision or recommendation should be held back until the election results have been announced is a judgement taken by senior managers in the Planning Inspectorate on the circumstances of the case.  We shall of course ensure that any such delayed decisions or recommendations are issued promptly after the election.”

“All scheduled local plan examinations and hearing sessions will continue during the pre-election period and new examinations will also begin. 

However, in order to avoid making announcements that could be politically sensitive, the Planning Inspectorate will not be issuing any letters regarding the soundness or legal compliance of local plans, or final reports (including for fact check), until after the election.”

You may also find useful the Local Government Association’s advice on publicity during the pre-election period. Note to LPAs:

“You are allowed to:

continue to discharge normal council business (including […] determining planning applications, even if they are controversial)”

Simon Ricketts, 23 May 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Labour’s Green Belt Grey Areas/Sadiq Khan’s London Manifesto

For those of us living or working in London, I reckon that Sadiq Khan’s manifesto for his next term as Mayor, published on 19 April 2024, is an important read. But yesterday it was rather drowned out by the media coverage that day of Labour’s press statement on green belt policy reform.

I’ll deal first with Labour’s green belt announcement.

As a country we certainly need to resolve the negative effects of this misunderstood policy concept (Sam Stafford’s updated blog post, The Green Belt. What it is; what it isn’t; and what it should be contains all (more than?) anyone could ever want to know about the subject). And for a sense of the sheer extent of green belt and its obvious consequent throttling effect on the areas it encircles, see for example Town Legal’s planning appeals map – green belt areas marked in … green).

It is surely positive in the context of a continuing, indeed worsening, housing crisis and the lack of other options which are likely to be sufficient and deliverable, that there is talk from Labour of using some green belt land to deliver more new homes. After all, even “going there” is politically brave. But fine words butter no parsnips. And I wonder whether the proposals in some ways just add to the confusion.

These are the core proposals from the press release :

“A Labour government would take a brownfield first approach to development across England, prioritising building on previously developed land in all circumstances and taking steps to improve upon the government’s lacklustre record of brownfield build out rates. Areas with enough brownfield land should not release greenbelt.

A Labour government will implement five ‘golden rules’ for Grey Belt development:

1.⁠  ⁠Brownfield first – Within the green belt, any brownfield land must be prioritised for development. 

2.  Grey Belt second – poor-quality and ugly areas of the Green Belt should be clearly prioritised over nature-rich, environmentally valuable land in the green belt. At present, beyond the existing brownfield category the system doesn’t differentiate between them. This category will be distinct to brownfield with a wider definition.

3.⁠ ⁠ Affordable homes – plans must target at least 50% affordable housing delivery when land is released.

4.⁠ ⁠ Boost public services and infrastructure – plans must boost public services and local infrastructure, like more school and nursery places, new health centres and GP appointments.

5.⁠ ⁠ Improve genuine green spaces – Labour rules out building on genuine nature spots and requires plans to include improvements to existing green spaces, making them accessible to the public, with new woodland, parks and playing fields. Plans should meet high environmental standards.”

What can we take from this as to what Labour would actually do, if elected?

This press statement is of course not intended to be picked over by people like me or you. Its purpose is to influence potential voters and to give us all a flavour of we would be likely to see, whilst giving plenty of wriggle-room when it comes to the actual implementation. So I’m not going to carp too much, but…

  • Are these tests for plan-makers or for decision-makers? If the former (likely), will there be a transition period before the new policy kicks in for decision-makers, if there is an otherwise up to date local plan?
  • So a basic hierarchy of brownfield; non-green belt greenfield; brownfield green belt; grey belt green belt; green belt green belt? It strikes me that this gives too much emphasis on the physical characteristics of the site itself rather than its sustainability and appropriateness in spatial terms? And how is this sequential testing to be carried out? The old questions as per the retail and flood risk sequential tests: to what extent can proposals be disaggregated; what is the area of search; deliverable over what period and what about where (as is often the case) there is not really a choice between site A and site B because the level of unmet need is such that A and B are both needed, and more besides?
  • How do references to “poor-quality and ugly” and “nature-rich, environmentally valuable” match up at all to the five traditional purposes for which green belt is designated – (a) to check the unrestricted sprawl of large built-up areas; (b) to prevent neighbouring towns merging into one another; (c) to assist in safeguarding the countryside from encroachment; (d) to preserve the setting and special character of historic towns; and (e) to assist in urban regeneration, by encouraging the recycling of derelict and other urban land. Is that what “poor-quality” means perhaps – not fulfilling those purposes?
  • If “brownfield” equates to what is currently defined as previously developed land, and treated less restrictively in green belt policy, give me an example of this untapped resource of non brownfield “grey belt”? And we’ve all gone on endlessly about the subjectivity of the concept of “beautiful” only now to be faced with a policy concept of “ugly“!
  • 50% is an eye-catching number for some areas but as a target what will actually change in practice? And define “affordable”. Will the opportunity be to introduce these requirements via national development management policies? That would be some exciting and early mission creep!
  • 4 and 5 are nothing new.
  • It’s not all about housing folks! What about logistics and other developments which need to be located in the green belt?

Now to Sadiq Khan’s manifesto, “A Fairer, Safer, Greener London” published ahead of the 2 May 2024 election. I’ll just draw out some quotes:

From his ten pledges:

3  Build 40,000 new council homes by the end of the decade

8  More support for renters – delivering new affordable ‘rent control homes’ and empowering Londoners to take on landlords through a New Deal for Renters

9  Continue world-leading action to tackle air pollution and the climate crisis – from making all buses zero-emission to providing air pollution filters to primary schools

10 Deliver a new London Growth Plan, with a target of creating more than 150,000 good jobs by 2028 and increasing living standards for Londoners

Under the heading “Tackling the housing crisis”:

“To unblock more new homes, I will take decisive action where needed to create new Land Assembly Zones and set up more Mayoral Development Corporations to boost overall housing supply and drive regeneration. These will deliver new sustainable communities with homes for first-time buyers as well as homes for social rent. I’ll work with a Labour government to strengthen planning so that the London Plan can go even further in supporting the delivery of the affordable housing our city needs, while unlocking economic growth and being the greenest ever plan for our city.”

Under the heading “Cleaning up London’s air”:

“making London the world’s first electric-vehicle ready global city by working with partners to double the amount of electric vehicle charging points installed since 2016 to more than 40,000 by 2030

continuing to oppose any expansion of airports in London”

Under the heading “Growing our economy”:

“I will build on our city’s economic recovery and set out an exciting new London Growth Plan, developed in close collaboration with councils, businesses and trade unions.

This new growth plan will set out how we can boost jobs and growth in the well-established sectors of our economy, including finance and business services; retail, hospitality, leisure and tourism; manufacturing; logistics; built environment and construction. I will also focus on and champion some of the fastest growing sectors, such as health and life sciences; digital including fintech, retail tech, cyber and AI; creative industries including film, fashion, TV, music and games; climate tech and the energy sector.”

“To help boost economic growth across our city, I will support individual boroughs to build on their strengths – from the new global culture and education powerhouse that is East Bank in Stratford, to the world-leading TV and film production cluster in West London, and the internationally influential cutting edge cancer research centre in Sutton. This also means working with councils and businesses to deliver a new vision and plan for the centre of London, ensuring that we can continue to compete with the central activity zones of other global cities like Paris and New York. London has roared back as a tourist destination since the pandemic and I’ll continue to work with partners to improve our tourism offer.”

“London is home to more than 600 high streets. We learned during the pandemic how intimately connected we are to local high streets, and their importance to our communities. That’s why I want to do more to protect, restore and improve them. If I’m re-elected, I will launch a support fund and set out a new vision for the future of London’s high streets, building on the work we have already done. I’ll also explore planning changes that can help breathe new life into our high streets, helping to ensure they remain a central feature of our economic and civic life.”

Not a word about green belt, you might note…

Simon Ricketts, 20 April 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Powering Up Britain

As a long-time collector of successive promises by politicians to reform the planning system – and the metaphors and alliteration used to that end – I was excited to see the Labour Party’s 28 March 2024 document Power and Partnership: Labour’s Plan to Power-Up Britain, published ahead of the 2 May 2024 local elections.

PUB gives the clearest set of indications yet as to what a future (possibly near future) Labour government’s priorities will be for planning, development and local government. It’s bold and you need to read it. I’ll just now give you some selective highlights. (I’ve emboldened the boldest commitments, towards the end of this post).

From the foreword by Keir Starmer and Angela Rayner:

“Growth in every corner of the country, so that every town, village and city has a role to play, and can reap the rewards of a decade of national renewal.”

From an initial section headed “the challenge we face”:

“Despite hoarding the levers of power, our centre remains passive in the face of huge national challenges…Our sclerotic planning system has left England unable to build the infrastructure and homes it needs; and endless Conservative chaos has undermined certainty and investment across the country.”

“We are currently not able to effectively integrate local, regional and national transport systems. Decisions on housing developments or commercial space chop and change at a moment’s notice. And the lack of a consistent economic strategy has undermined  business confidence  and  investment.”

From a section headed “empowering communities to power up Britain”:

“Local and sub- regional decision- makers often possess better information about their local economies, and more developed capacity for working with local businesses and institutions. By giving local leaders a greater say, we can focus policies at the scale at which people live and work and at which businesses specialise and form  economic clusters.

We also should not make policy on a scale which is so local that it does not reflect people ’s working, commuting and social patterns – people often cross administrative borders every day as they go to work or head into their town centre. OECD research indicates that administrative fragmentation at a local level holds productivity back.

By holding strategic decision- making over housing policy at a local authority level, for example, we are failing to seize the opportunity to build more homes in places where people need them  to live and work.

We believe new combined authorities or devolution settlements should be tailored to functional economic areas. This is central to the economic promise of taking back control and will be necessary for local leaders to effectively deploy skills, transport, housing and other labour market policies and unlock new long- term , integrated funding settlements. By deepening devolution to city regions, we will make sure that the towns and cities that built the foundations of modern Britain are given the tools they need to thrive in the modern service and high- value manufacturing economy.

We  will also reap  the benefits of combining  scale with local knowledge, joining up the power of an active state with the information available to local leaders. We will work to build up capacity in local and sub- regional government and we will deliver a new institutional framework for partnership working and joined- up decision- making.”

From a section entitled “an active centre to power up Britain”:

“Labour’s plan for growth includes action at a national scale to address the failures outlined in this document. This includes a plan to steam ahead in the industries of the future, with a modern UK industrial strategy supported by tailored sector strategies and, in England, Local Growth Plans; strategic public investment via our National Wealth Fund across the United Kingdom ; wholesale reform to England’s system  of planning for housing and infrastructure…

Just as our plan will require local leaders to be active players, it will require a greater level of strategy and direction from  national government. It will involve the reintroduction of mandatory local housing targets to get Britain building again…”

A section entitled “English devolution” starts with three bullet points:

  •  Turbocharge mayors with access to new powers over transport, skills, housing, planning, employment support and energy, supported by long- term integrated funding settlements.
  • Work to expand devolution further and faster, with local authorities coming together to take on new powers to boost their economies.
  • Roll out new Local Growth Plans to towns and cities take advantage of their economic potential and foster clusters of well- paid jobs.

“A Labour government will ask all councils outside of an existing or agreed combined authority or county devolution deal to begin preparatory work to join together on sensible economic geographies and take on a new suite of powers through our enhanced devolution framework to benefit their residents. We will provide them with support and guidance to do so through the leadership of the Secretary of State and the expertise of the Department.“

“We will create a statutory obligation on all combined authorities and counties with devolution deals to develop a Local Growth Plan based on those functional economic geographies which identifies economic  clusters and  sets out their plans to build on their local advantages, the key binding constraints of their local economies and how they will use the powers devolved from  central government to support local growth.”

Labour will “provide longer- term funding settlements for councils, giving them  the certainty they need to deliver better value for money”.

From a section entitled “high streets”, there is a commitment to “give communities the power to revamp empty shops, pubs and community spaces with a strong new Community Right to Buy”

A section headed “building homes” starts with three bullet points:

  • Build 1.5 million new homes over the next parliament, unleashing growth and putting more money into people’s pockets.
  • Deliver the biggest boost of social and affordable housebuilding in a generation, embedding security and stability in our economy.
  • Empower metro mayors to deliver new housing projects linked up to the jobs and infrastructure needed to support regional growth.

“Labour will build 1.5 million high quality homes in the right places, with new towns, urban extensions and smaller developments – and they will be connected to infrastructure and built strategically as part of sub-regional strategies from mayors and combined authorities. This will increase the ‘effective size’ of our major cities and high- potential towns so that they  can reap  the  benefits of scale  and agglomeration needed to develop and cement their labour market clusters and comparative strengths.

Our approach combines robust national policy frameworks, including targets for housing delivery, with measures to support local leaders delivering plans for meeting those targets and ensuring homes are built in the right place. We want to give local leaders a say over ‘how’ new homes are delivered, whilst being robust in national policy about ‘if’ areas build the homes they need.”

Labour will deliver:

“• The biggest boost in affordable homes for a generation – with social and council housing at the core of Labour’s plan for secure homes.

• A housing recovery plan, a blitz of planning reform to quickly and materially boost house building , delivered in our first weeks and months in office .

• The next generation of new towns , garden cities and large sites, new communities with beautiful homes, green spaces, reliable transport and bustling high streets

• New powers to unleash mayors including a package of devolution to mayors, handing them stronger powers over planning and departmental style settlements for housing

• ‘Planning passports ’ for urban brownfield delivery, a tough package of planning reform to fast track approvals and delivery of high density housing on urban brownfield  sites

• 300 new planning officers  across  the  country, paid for by raising the stamp duty surcharge on non- UK residents, to improve public sector capacity to expedite planning decisions.”

Fasten your seatbelts.

Simon Ricketts, 13 April 2024

Personal views, et cetera

The Only Way Is Up

I remember watching Don’t Look Up on new year’s day 2022. Not the best film ever but certainly an apt analogy when It comes to the climate crisis. I can’t believe that was two years ago. Where does the time go?

I’m going to briefly look up again. Last year was the second warmest ever in the UK and the period since July 2023 has been the wettest in 130 years.

And there’s certainly been some domestic political heat around climate issues. I’m thinking back to my 5 August 2023 blog post Does The Government Have An Environmental Strategy Or Is It More Of A Tactic?

Today’s post was simply going to point to guidance published jointly by the Department for Culture, Media & Sport, the Department for Energy Security and DLUHC: Adapting historic homes for energy efficiency: a review of the barriers (3 January 2024) – and I’ll come to that.

But then news came through yesterday afternoon of Conservative MP Chris Skidmore’s resignation of the party whip (5 January 2024).

I had praised Skidmore’s independent review last year of the Government’s net zero plans in my 21 January 2023 blog post Mission Zero Needs Planning. He knows what he’s talking about on the subject.

Here is his resignation statement in full:

“Next week the government will be introducing the Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill in the House of Commons.

This bill would in effect allow more frequent new oil and gas licences and the increased production of new fossil fuels in the North Sea. It is a bill that I have already stated my opposition to, by not voting in the King’s Speech debate in protest at the bill’s inclusion in the government’s legislative programme.

As the former Energy Minister who signed the UK’s net zero commitment by 2050 into law, I cannot vote for a bill that clearly promotes the production of new oil and gas. While no one is denying that there is a role for existing oil and gas in the transition to net zero, the International Energy Agency, the UNCCC and the Committee on Climate Change have all stated that there must be no new additional oil and gas production on top of what has already been committed, if we are to both reach net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2050 and keep the chance of limiting temperature rises to 1.5 degrees.

Decisions taken at COP28 last month also set in motion the global transition away from fossil fuels. As the exponential growth of renewable and clean power continues, as we seek to reduce our energy demand for fossil fuels through the adoption of better energy efficiency in buildings and industry, as the adoption of electricity replaces fossil fuels, there is no case to be made for increasing fossil fuel production at a time when investment should be made elsewhere, in the industries and businesses of the future, and not of the past.

As fossil fuels become more obsolete, expanding new oil and gas licences or opening new oil fields will only create stranded assets of the future, harming local and regional communities that should instead be supported to transition their skills and expertise to renewable and clean energy.

The Net Zero Review I published a year ago next week, Mission Zero, set out how net zero can be the economic opportunity of this decade, if not our generation, bringing with it hundreds of thousands of new jobs, new growth, new regeneration and inward investment worth hundreds of billions of pounds. To achieve this however requires long term commitment to the energy transition, and a clear and consistent message to business and industry that the UK is committed to climate action as a global leader, as it has been for the past two decades.

The bill that will be debated next week achieves nothing apart from to send a global signal that the UK is rowing ever further back from its climate commitments. We cannot expect other countries to phase out their fossil fuels when at the same time we continue to issue new licences or to open new oil fields. It is a tragedy that the UK has been allowed to lose its climate leadership, at a time when our businesses, industries, universities and civil society organisations are providing first class leadership and expertise to so many across the world, inspiring change for the better.

I cannot vote for the bill next week. The future will judge harshly those that do. At a time when we should be committing to more climate action, we simply do not have any more time to waste promoting the future production of fossil fuels that is the ultimate cause of the environmental crisis that we are facing.

But I can also no longer condone nor continue to support a government that is committed to a course of action that I know is wrong and will cause future harm. To fail to act, rather than merely speak out, is to tolerate a status quo that cannot be sustained. I am therefore resigning my party whip and instead intend to be free from any party-political allegiance.

I am deeply grateful for the privilege I have had to serve in government across several departments, including as Energy Minister attending Cabinet, and to have been appointed as the Independent Chair of the Net Zero Review. It is nearly fourteen years since I was first elected as the Member of Parliament for Kingswood, and I am especially grateful to my constituents for placing their repeated trust and faith in me. First and foremost, my duty has been to serve them, as their elected representative.

It is with that duty to them in mind as their representative that my personal decision today means, as I have long argued, that they deserve the right to elect a new Member of Parliament. I therefore will be standing down from Parliament as soon as possible.

It has been a remarkable and wonderful opportunity to serve as a Member of Parliament for nearly fourteen years, but I now intend to focus all my energy and attention on delivering net zero and the energy transition.”

A pretty devastating critique.

Against that broader background, it’s difficult to do anything with the Adapting historic homes for energy efficiency: a review of the barriers guidance document (3 January 2024) than damn it with faint praise.

As stated in the document’s introduction:

“Alongside the need to protect and conserve, historic homes have an important contribution to make in meeting our Net Zero objectives, both in terms of their contribution to the broader UK energy efficiency and low carbon heat agenda, and in the carbon which is saved through their continued use and reuse. Historic properties make up a significant proportion of the UK’s building stock, with 5.9 million buildings constructed before 1919. Historic properties can and should be part of the solution, and this report is intended to maximise their potential in supporting our progress towards Net Zero.

Through this review, we have gained a better understanding of the practical barriers that owners of listed buildings and homes in conservation areas face when they want to install energy efficiency or low-carbon heating measures in their properties.” 

The document follows a commitment in the Government’s April 2022 British Energy Security Strategy. It contains sections on the role of the planning system; issues with local authority skills, training and capacity; guidance available for homeowners and occupiers; construction industry sills, training and capacity, and affordability and financial incentives. It concludes with a summary of the 55 actions and future commitments arising. The seven under the heading “planning” are as follows:

  • Delivery of planning reform through the Levelling-Up and Regeneration Act so that it supports good design and environmental outcomes better, is less complex, and easier to engage with            
  • Implementation of the newly updated National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), including a new policy to support energy efficiency improvements to existing buildings       
  • Consult on changes to permitted development rights for heat pumps in England
  • Consultation on National Development Management Policies including specifically on improvements to historic buildings
  • Consult on the opportunities for greater use of Listed Building Consent Orders (LBCOs) to support energy efficiency improvements to listed buildings              
  • Support Local Planning Authorities that wish to develop exemplar Local Listed Building Consent Orders   (Historic England)
  • Publish a Historic England Advice Note (HEAN) on Climate Change and Historic Building Adaptation to help decision-makers deliver climate action while protecting heritage (Historic England)

The announcements as to national development management policies and also local listed building consent orders are potentially interesting. This is what the document itself says:

“First, as part of the implementation of National Development Management Policies following Royal Assent of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act, DLUHC will create new National Development Management Policies (NDMPs), including a policy specifically for improvements to historic buildings. This policy will be integrated into the wider suite of heritage National Development Management Policies which will replace current policy affecting decision making in chapter 16 of the National Planning Policy Framework. In doing so, this will help to ensure greater certainty and consistency about decisions on applications for energy efficiency improvements affecting listed buildings and buildings in conservation areas across England. The government will consult on this new policy as part of its development of National Development Management Policies.

Second, the review has demonstrated there is a significant appetite for increasing the use of Local Listed Building Consent Orders to provide upfront listed building consent for certain common energy efficiency improvements on listed buildings so owners can make these improvements without the need to apply for consent. There is not, however, a clear consensus from stakeholders about how and when Local Listed Building Consent Orders should be used to support these energy efficiency improvements. In particular, it will be important that these orders do not permit energy efficiency measures which harm the significance of listed buildings.

As a first step, DLUHC will consult on the opportunities for using Local Listed Building Consent Orders to support energy efficiency improvements on listed buildings. The consultation will specifically ask about:

  • the role for Local Listed Building Consent Orders prepared by local planning authorities; and
  • the potential for a Listed Building Consent Order made by the Secretary of State which would grant listed building consent for certain improvements across England.”

Here’s to much more of this, in particular to closer working between DLUHC and the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, and in particular to politicians such as Mr Skidmore actually prepared to look up.

Simon Ricketts, 6 January 2024

Personal views, et cetera

Pic by Christian Wiediger via Unspash

London 2024

The next London Mayoral election will be held on 2 May 2024.

As of 9 November 2023 Sadiq Khan held a 25 point lead over conservative candidate Susan Hall, according to a YouGov poll. Anything could of course happen between now and 2 May though, the greatest risk for Khan possibly being if Jeremy Corbyn stands as an independent candidate and splits the labour vote. The deadline for candidate nominations is 27 March so I suspect we will see increasing levels of speculation in the meantime…

To his left, Mr Corbyn. To his right, Mr Gove.

As part of the flurry of DLUHC announcements on 19 December 2023 (see my blog post that day, In DLUHC Jubilo: NPPF & Much More), the Secretary of State wrote to Mr Khan. The letter included the following passage:

“Due to the significant shortfall in housing supply and under delivery of housing in our capital, I have concluded that it may be necessary to take further action now, as a matter of urgency, to make sure London is delivering the homes our capital needs.

With this in mind, I have asked Christopher Katkowski KC to lead a panel of expert advisers comprising Cllr James Jamieson, Paul Monaghan, and Dr Wei Yang, to consider the aspects of your London Plan which could be preventing thousands of homes being brought forward, with a particular focus on brownfield sites in the heart of our capital. I have asked them to produce their report by January and will make sure that it is shared with you.

If you cannot do what is needed to deliver the homes that London needs, I will.”

The terms of reference given to the advisors were published on 22 December 2023. Lichfields have been appointed along with the advisors previously announced.

“The expert advisers will assess whether there are specific changes to London Plan policies that could facilitate urban brownfield regeneration in London for housing delivery in an appropriate manner and, if necessary, recommend changes to the London Plan accordingly.

The output of the review will be a short report, delivered by 15 January 2024, to the Secretary of State.”

The objectives of the work are as follows:

“To consider and, if appropriate, make recommendations for specific changes to the London Plan. The Secretary of State will share the recommendations with the Mayor to consider their implementation.

To work with Lichfields consultants to ensure that there is an evidence base which supports the recommendations of the expert advisers.

To complete a report on how, specifically, the London Plan could be improved to facilitate the delivery of new homes on brownfield sites.”

15 January! It will be interesting to see what emerges. I assume that aside from the implications of the detailed and prescriptive approach taken by the London Plan – a document which is instead meant to operate only at a strategic level – one potential area for investigation will be the extent to which the Mayor’s rigid approach to minimum levels of affordable housing, even in the face of agreed unviability, and/or his requirements as to review mechanisms which can cause difficulties with funders, is holding back delivery (although of course the Mayor’s response is always to point to the level of need for social housing). Will another be the Mayor’s resistance to development in the green belt? But this would only make sense in the context of Mr Gove’s letter if the focus is on previously developed land in the green belt – and even this would uncomfortably with the Government’s 19 December 2023 revision to the NPPF, absolving authorities of the need to review green belt boundaries when preparing local plans…

Are there possibly any clues in two recent Secretary of State decisions?

On 11 December 2023 the Secretary of State overturned inspector Jennifer Vyse’s recommendation and granted planning permission in relation to called-in applications for mixed use development at Homebase and Tesco Osterley, Syon Lane, Hounslow. His approach to the planning balance and overall conclusion in  his decision letter is as follows:

“64. For the reasons given above, the Secretary of State considers that the application is not in accordance with LonP policies D9 and HC1 and LP policies CC3 and CC4 of the development plan, and is not in accordance with the development plan overall. He has gone on to consider whether there are material considerations which indicate that the proposal should be determined other than in line with the development plan.

65. Weighing in favour of the proposal is the regeneration of under-utilised brownfield land which carries substantial weight. Also weighing in favour is the delivery of up to 2,150 homes which carries substantial weight, and the delivery of 750 affordable homes designed to meet the current housing need profile in Hounslow, which each carry substantial weight. Economic benefits carry significant weight whilst the provision of open space and significant biodiversity net gain both carry moderate weight.  Highway and transport improvements carry limited to moderate weight and the reprovision of an existing Tesco store and the provision of community space each carry limited weight.

66. Weighing against the proposal is less than substantial harm to a number of designated heritage assets which carries great weight. Moderate harm to the character and appearance of the area in relation to the Homebase scheme carries moderate weight. Heritage harm caused by the total loss of a non-designated heritage asset (the Homebase store) carries limited weight and the Secretary of State has considered paragraph 203 of the Framework in coming to this decision.

67. In line with the heritage balance set out at paragraph 202 of the Framework, the Secretary of State has considered whether the identified less than substantial harm to the significance of each designated heritage asset is outweighed by the public benefits of the proposal. Taking into the account the public benefits of the proposal as identified in this decision letter, the Secretary of State agrees with the Inspector at IR15.11 that the public benefits of the appeal scheme are more than sufficient to outweigh the identified harm, including cumulative harm, to the significance of the designated heritage assets. He considers that the balancing exercise under paragraph 202 of the Framework is therefore favourable to the proposal.

68. Overall, in applying s.38(6) of the PCPA 2004, the Secretary of State considers that despite the conflict with the development plan, the material considerations in this case indicate that permission should be granted.

69. The Secretary of State therefore concludes that planning permission should be granted.”

Note the weight placed on delivery of homes, including affordable homes, on under-utilised brownfield land, together with economic benefits, versus heritage harm.

On 4 December 2023 the Secretary of State agreed with his inspector’s recommendation and granted planning permission for the demolition of existing buildings and the comprehensive phased redevelopment of the site for a mix of uses including up to 1,049 residential units and up to 1,200 square metres of flexible commercial and community floorspace in buildings ranging from 3 to 18 storeys along with car and cycle parking, landscaping and associated works. His decision letter demonstrates a similar balancing exercise, in the additional context of Barnet Council not having a five year supply of housing land:

“35. Weighing in favour of the proposal is the delivery of market and affordable housing which each carry significant weight; the reduction in traffic, provision of open space, biodiversity improvements, regeneration benefits and employment provisions which each carry moderate weight; and improvement in healthcare facilities which carries minimal weight.

36. Weighing against the proposal is the less than substantial harm to the designated heritage asset which carries great weight.

37. In line with the heritage balance set out at paragraph 202 of the Framework, the Secretary of State has considered whether the identified less than substantial harm to the significance of the designated heritage asset is outweighed by the public benefits of the proposal. Taking into the account the public benefits of the proposal as identified in this decision letter, overall, the Secretary of State agrees with the Inspector at IR238 that the public benefits outweigh the identified less than substantial harm to the significance of the designated heritage asset, and that the proposal would secure the optimum viable use of the site (IR235). He therefore considers that the balancing exercise under paragraph 202 of the Framework is favourable to the proposal.”

Whatever we think of the Secretary of State’s reasoning in granting these permissions, let’s not give him credit for thereby speeding up the development process. These were both applications which had been resolved to be approved by Hounslow and Barnet respectively in 2021!

Finally, how about this for petty point scoring, in relation to the continuing political pawn which is the Mayor’s extended ULEZ scheme? The Secretary of State would like the Mayor to arrange for vehicles that are the subject of his scrappage scheme to be provided to Ukraine to help with its war effort. The Mayor’s position is that this is not within his legal powers. This is Mr Gove’s latest letter dated 21 December 2023 to the Mayor of London. I have no idea what the right answer is on this specific issue but in a year where there are too many real battle grounds around the globe, perhaps let’s try to avoid unnecessary domestic political battlegrounds? Even in an election year?

Simon Ricketts, 30 December 2023

Personal views, et cetera

PS It’s so often been the case that I’ve had some song going through my head when writing one of these posts that I thought as an end of year gift I would present to you this Spotify playlist – a track for each post this year – I’m sure you’ll be able to match them up…

See you in 2024.

From YouGov 9 November 2023 poll