Category: Politics

2023 Unwrapped (Or The Case Of The DLUHC That Didn’t Bark?)

A pause to reflect as we wait for the latest version of the NPPF finally to be published, possibly in the coming week.

My final post of 2022, It Will Soon Be Christmas & We Really Don’t Have To Rush To Conclusions On This New NPPF Consultation Draft covered the publication on 22 December 2022 of the consultation draft. Back then the final version was to be published in Spring 2023. Never trust a DLUHC time estimate…

That timescale assumed that the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill would receive Royal Assent that Spring. Ho ho ho. The Act finally received Royal Assent on 26 October 2023, although, as set out in my 4 November 2023 blog post Act Up!, nothing substantive has yet come into force, most elements requiring secondary legislation with only limited sections being switched on from Boxing Day. (My firm has prepared a detailed summary of the planning reform aspects of the Act, running to some 41 pages. Do message or email me if you would like a copy.)

Judging from the tone of DLUHC’s 28 November 2023 response to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee’s reforms to national planning policy report, together with Mr Gove’s appearance before the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee on 6 December 2023, we assume that the final version of the NPPF will reflect quite closely the December 2022 draft, but time will tell.

Of course, barring a general election in the meantime, in 2024 we will then have consultation on further proposed revisions to the NPPF, to reflect LURA’s proposed reforms to plan-making, and consultation on much else besides.

In the meantime, 2023 has seen yet more ministerial changes with Rachel Maclean sacked in favour of an expanded role for Lee Rowley. There have been at best sporadic attempts to discourage local authorities from withdrawing emerging plans (Spelthorne and Erewash). There has been a self-styled long-term plan for housing. There have been sporadic culture wars – for example the swipe at South Cambridgeshire District Council for its four-day working week trial (anyone remember localism? I have an old book to flog).

But has anything really moved the dial in terms of encouraging housebuilding or indeed encouraging economic activity? Far from it if yesterday’s Planning Resource headline is anything to go by: Number of planning applications plummets 12% year-on-year in latest quarterly government figures (8 December 2023, behind paywall)

Spotify-style, I looked back at which simonicity posts were most widely read, last year. Perhaps this list tells its own story – one of procedural hurdles, unnecessary complexity and political climbdowns. In order:

  1. M&S Mess (21 July 2023). We wait to see what the High Court makes of Mr Gove’s 20 July 2023 decision letter.
  1. Thank You Mikael Armstrong: New Case On Scope Of Section 73 (28 January 2023). The Armstrong case has now been supplemented by R (Fiske) v Test Valley Borough Council (Morris J, 6 September 2023). The scope of section 73 remains a live issue, although the legal boundaries are now pretty clear ahead of the coming into force of section 73B which will raise new questions.
  1. The Government’s Big Move On Nutrient Neutrality – Now We Have Seen The Government’s LURB Amendment (29 August 2023). The subsequent defeat suffered by the Government on this in the House of Lords was possibly DLUHC’s most embarrassing moment of the year, when taken with the subsequent, aborted, attempt by the Government to introduce a fresh Bill.
  1. New Draft London Guidance On Affordable Housing/Viability (6 May 2023). These are critical issues, particularly in London, and we need to understand as clearly as possible the Mayor’s position. But the GLA draft guidance continues to grow like topsy. Since that post in May we have also had draft guidance on purpose-built student accommodation and on digital connectivity – and in the last week we have had draft industrial land and uses guidance.
  1. Euston We Have A Problem (8 July 2023). Subsequent to the post there was then of course the Government’s total  abandonment of proposals for HS2 north of Birmingham (see my 4 October 2023 blog post, Drive Time) and wishful thinking as to a privately funded terminus for HS2 at Euston. It will be interesting to see what happens this coming year to the idea of a new “Euston Quarter” Development Corporation.

Incidentally, thank you everyone for continuing to read this blog, now in its eighth year (with more daily views than ever before), and for occasionally saying nice things about it. Believe me, I would otherwise have given up a long time ago. I did hope that I could pass it over to chatGPT next year but from early experimentation I suspect not:

Simon Ricketts, 9 December 2023

Personal views, et cetera

Drive Time

Turbulent times as the Conservative party desperately looks to position itself for the next general election, still mindful, it seems, of its narrow, anti-ULEZ fuelled, win in the Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election in July 2023.

I wonder if the prime minister has recently read chapter 9 of the NPPF (“Promoting Sustainable Transport”)?

 I wonder if the prime minister recalls that since 1 June 2023 a new Government quango, Active Travel England is a statutory consultee on all large planning applications to “to help planning authorities in their work to implement good active travel design – for example, by ensuring developments include walking, wheeling and cycling connectivity to schools and local amenities. This will help improve public health, save people money and reduce harmful emissions.” ATE’s framework document may be seen as dangerously woke in this new political climate, aiming to deliver increases in active travel to 50% of all journeys in urban areas.

I wonder if the prime minister recalls his Government’s Net Zero Strategy: Build Back Greener with commitments such as:

  • “End the sale of new petrol and diesel cars and vans from 2030; from 2035, all new cars and vans must be zero emission at the tailpipe.” (long gone)
  • “Increase the share of journeys taken by public transport, cycling and walking.”
  • “Invest £2 billion in cycling and walking, building first hundreds, then thousands of miles of segregated cycle lane and more low-traffic neighbourhoods with the aim that half of all journeys in towns and cities will be cycled or walked by 2030. As announced in the Transport Decarbonisation Plan, we will create at least one zero emission transport city.”

The party’s Manchester conference saw two major policy announcements by the Government on transport (neither made first to Parliament as convention requires):

The Plan for Drivers  (2 October 2023)

Network North: Transforming British Transport (4 October 2023)

From the foreword to the Plan for Drivers, the car is king again:

“There’s nothing wrong with driving. Most of us use a car and, for many, life would not be liveable without their car. For those in rural areas, it is a lifeline. A car can hugely expand the independence of a younger person, as well as keep older people connected to key services and their families.”

There is the rather grudging nod to other modes of transport, but whatever you do, don’t vilify the private car:

“Walking, cycling and public transport are necessary in a multi-modal transport system and we support their continued growth, but they are not the right choice for everyone’s journey. Being pro-public transport does not mean being anti-car. The easy political choice is to vilify the private car even when it’s been one of the most powerful forces for personal freedom and economic growth in the last century. Used appropriately and considerately, the car was, is, and will remain a force for good.”

That first sentence is somewhat mealy mouthed in the face of what follows. The Government apparently intends to:

  • “update guidance (in England) on 20mph speed limits. While 20mph zones are an important tool in improving road safety in residential areas, over-use risks undermining public acceptance, so we are clear that 20mph zones should be considered on a road-by-road basis to ensure local consent, not as blanket measures
  • stop local authorities using so-called “15-minute cities” to police people’s lives. We will consult on measures including the removal of local authorities’ access to DVLA data to enforce such schemes by camera
  • following the LTN review, consider new guidance on LTNs with a focus on the importance of local support, and consider as part of the LTN review how to address existing LTNs that have not secured local consent”

Local authorities policing people’s lives via “15 minute cities” enforced by cameras? Bizarre.

There will be restrictions on the operation of bus lanes, measures to make parking easier, discouragement of penalty charge notices. And so it goes on.

And then today we had, to accompany the prime minister’s party conference speech, Network North – serving as the political cover for today’s decision to scrap HS2 north of Birmingham. Regardless of the noise about monies being diverted to other transport projects (many of which, worryingly for our climate change targets, are of course road projects), the cancellation decision is disturbing – not just for people and businesses who would have benefited from the longer route – but of course hugely upsetting also those whose properties have already been taken, as well of all of us whose money has been spent, irreversibly changing the environment including areas of outstanding natural beauty and ancient woodlands, on the basis of asserted public benefits that will now never be fully realised. In retrospect, today’s decision raises question marks over the initial decision by David Cameron’s government to proceed – as well as subsequent governments’ decisions to continue.

I was at least pleased to see that the Government has at re-committed to the line actually reaching Euston:

“We are going to strip back the project and deliver a station that works, and that can be open and running trains as soon as possible, and which has the leadership in place to deliver maximum value to the taxpayer. We will not provide a tunnel between Euston and Euston Square underground station or design features we do not need. Instead we will deliver a 6-platform station which can accommodate the trains we will run to Birmingham and onwards and which best supports regeneration of the local area. That is how we properly unlock the opportunities the new station offers, while radically reducing its costs.

We will appoint a development company, separate from HS2 Ltd, to manage the delivery of this project. We will also take on the lessons of success stories such as Battersea Power Station and Nine Elms, which secured £9 billion of private sector investment and thousands of homes. So we will harness the future growth that the station will unleash to support its development, to ensure we get the best possible value for the British taxpayer – and ensure that funding is underpinned by contributions from those people and businesses its development supports. At the same time, we are considerably upping the ambition of the Euston redevelopment, where we will be looking to establish a Development Corporation to create a transformed ‘Euston Quarter’ – potentially offering up to 10,000 homes.”

It will be interesting to see what ensues.

Foot to the floor, election ahead….

Simon Ricketts,4 October 2023

Personal views, et cetera

Detail from one of the first records I ever owned…

Does The Government Have An Environmental Strategy Or Is It More Of A Tactic?

First, a scary graph:

(Source: BBC news piece, Ocean heat record broken, with grim implications for the planet)

The extent of the climate crisis is becoming plainer by the month. The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres was reported on 27 July 2023 as saying that the era of global warming had ended and that the era of “global boiling” had arrived. July 2023 was the world’s hottest month on record. I saw a retired housebuilder scoff on LinkedIn that he had never heard anything as ridiculous as “global boiling”. I found that quite triggering in the current context and so apologies that I am not writing this week about any interesting planning law cases.

Instead, not in any way as an expert, but instead as a confused citizen, I’m asking myself…

What is the government’s current strategy on climate change and the environment, in the light of, for instance, the Prime Minister’s comments in the Telegraph on 29 July 2023 about being on the side of motorists and announcing on 31 July 2023 hundreds of new North Sea oil and gas licences to boost British energy independence and grow the economy?

I’m reminded of the “Be a strategist” chapter in Alastair Campbell’s book But What Can I do? Strategy = OST:

“O = Objective (what you want to achieve)

S = Strategy (‘the big how’: your definition of the overall approach)

T = Tactics (the detailed plans required to execute the strategy)“

Surely, the objective is, and should remain, to do all that we can do as a leading developed nation to encourage the world to combat the climate crisis.

I thought the Government’s strategy was well-documented, set out in its Net Zero Strategy: Build Back Greener (updated 5 April 2022) (reviewed earlier this year by Chris Skidmore – see my 21 January 2023 blog post Mission Zero Needs Planning) and by way of its longstanding commitments set out in the Climate Change Act 2008 , policed by the Climate Change Committee which was established for that purpose, including the objective of achieving net zero by 2050. You can question whether the strategy is ambitious enough but there it is.

The tactics to be deployed to achieve the objective are all of those individual measures set out and flowing from the strategy, including those set out in the Government’s 2023 carbon delivery plan.

However, I’m sensing that the prime minister’s OST instead may currently look like this:

O = Secure re-election or at least not too heavy a defeat

S = Win votes via populist “culture war” issues; have any sort of positive economic narrative come election time

T = Noise about eg being on the side of the motorist; prioritising economic growth over the net zero programme.

Of course, any debate on these issues gets bogged down in complexity. Argue about the stats, the projections and promised protections (carbon capture and storage etc etc), anything but just Don’t Look Up!

Perhaps let’s turn to that body that was set up by the 2008 Act. The Climate Change Committee published its 2023 Progress Report to Parliament on 28 June 2023). Reviewing the Government’s March 2023 Carbon Budget Delivery Plan  and the Government’s wider policy development, the CCC’s key messages are:

  • “A lack of urgency. While the policy framework has continued to develop over the past year, this is not happening at the required pace for future targets.
  • Stay firm on existing commitments and move to delivery. The Government has made a number of strong commitments, these must be restated and moved as swiftly as possible towards delivery.
  • Retake a clear leadership role internationally. The UK will need to regain its international climate leadership.
  • Immediate priority actions and policies. Action is needed in a range of areas to deliver on the Government’s emissions pathway.
  • Develop demand-side and land use policies. The Government’s current strategy has considerable delivery risks due to its over-reliance on specific technological solutions, some of which have not yet been deployed at scale.
  • Empower and inform households and communities to make low-carbon choices. Despite some positive steps to provide households with advice on reducing energy use in the last year, a coherent public engagement strategy on climate action is long overdue.
  • Planning policy needs radical reform to support Net Zero. The planning system must have an overarching requirement that all planning decisions must be taken giving full regard to the imperative of Net Zero.
  • Expansion of fossil fuel production is not in line with Net Zero. As well as pushing forward strongly with new low-carbon industries, Net Zero also makes it necessary to move away from high-carbon developments.
  • The need for a framework to manage airport capacity. There has been continued airport expansion in recent years, counter to our assessment that there should be no net airport expansion across the UK.”

Alongside the report the following supporting research was published:

This all pre-dated last week’s oil and gas licensing announcement. Is there any case in 2023 for further extraction of fossil fuels? The CCC’s outgoing chair Lord Deben however made his views clear in a 3 August 2023 article for New Statesman: North Sea licences tell big oil we’re not serious about net zero.

And what about this stuff about being on the side of the motorist? It’s surely all adding up to a growing, tactical, culture war around climate issues. By-elections can unexpectedly become policy inflexion points – as we saw with the Chesham and Amersham by-election result in June 2021 that effectively scuppered a previous attempt to reform the planning system. Both main parties took from the 20 July 2023 Uxbridge and South Ruislip result that the Conservative candidate’s achievement in narrowly holding onto the seat was down to the unpopularity of London Mayor Sadiq Khan’s programme to extend the Ultra Low Emission Zone to outer London. Hence Keir Starmer’s disappointing wobble the next day but also, in spades, the Tory response. Here was an issue to rally behind, supposedly in support of those not able to afford to replace their older vehicles with ones which would be ULEZ compliant (although that fox has probably been shot by Khan’s 4 August Mayor announces massive expansion of scrappage scheme to all Londoners) but more widely an opportunity to mine a “pro-car”/anti- regulation seam – hence also the prime minister’s announced review on low traffic neighbourhoods. The Local Government Association’s view is clear: Councils best placed to make decisions with communities (30 July 2023). But this is a culture war – if local government folk (and probably people like you and me too) object, so much the better, is likely to be some political strategists’ thinking. And of course, along with all the political brouhaha come the inevitable legal challenges – on 28 July 2023 Hillingdon, Bexley, Bromley, Harrow and Surrey Councils failed in their judicial review of the proposed ULEZ expansion.

Let me throw in here some commentary more rooted in planning law. I was interested to receive a comment on my recent blog post about the M&S Oxford Street decision letter. The comment was along the lines of whether there was anything to stop M&S in any event demolishing the building, unlisted, not in a conservation area, relying on the prior approval right to do that in the General Permitted Development Order. This really does illustrate the lack of joined up thinking in planning legislation. Should demolition be more closely regulated? Why, when there is current consultation on possible changes to the General Permitted Development Order, and if minimising the loss of embodied carbon is now a Government objective (no clear policy on that, we are left reading between the lines), is there still, for instance, the demolition and rebuild (with 1,000 sq m cap)  commercial to residential right, only introduced in 2020?!

Finally, to hear views and debate on the Government’s recent announcements on planning reform that were the subject of my blog post last week The Message, you can listen back to our two hour-long Clubhouse sessions on the issues – here for the discussion of Michael Gove’s 24 July statement as to his long-term plan for housing and here for detail on proposed reforms to plan-making, the GPDO and application fees. And although I’m not wedded to the idea unless there is real interest, if anyone would like to speak at a future Clubhouse session about the issues in this blog post then let me know.

And final final plug – there’s a very small but growing planning community on Threads, which is certainly improving as a more wholesome alternative to Twix (they have largely sorted out the issues which initially were so annoying for people). Feel free to join by downloading the app via Apple’s App Store or Google Play for Android – still only by mobile device, although that will change in the next few weeks. An interesting time lies ahead and I’m feeling that we are going to need to share our thinking…

Simon Ricketts, 5 August 2023

Personal views, et cetera

Image courtesy of Don’t Look Up (Netflix)

What Should We Call The Planning Version Of Trussenomics? And A Pox On The PEx PAX

Is the planning system now in a holding pattern until the general election? It certainly feels that way.

The consultation announced in December 2022 over proposed changes to the NPPF (see my 22 December 2022 blog post It Will Soon Be Christmas & We Really Don’t Have To Rush To Conclusions On This New NPPF Consultation Draft) led many authorities to delay or withdraw their local plans (see for instance Local Plan Watch: The 26 authorities that have paused or delayed their local plans since the government announced housing need changes (Planning Resource, 27 April 2023 (subscription)) and Delayed Local Plans (HBF, 27 March 2023)). The thought occurred to me this week when I was speaking with Peter Geraghty at a TCPA event (congratulations David Lock for your well-deserved Ebenezer Howard medal): if Trussenomics described the event that led to last Autumn’s economic crisis (the repercussions of which persist), what should be the word for that 22 December announcement?

Even if the policy thrust set out in the 22 December announcement was appropriate and worth some short-term process turbulence, it has already stalled. So, what really was the point (aside of course from its politically necessary signalling of capitulation to Conservative backbenchers’ concerns over the prospect of development taking place in their constituencies)? Consultation closed on 3 March 2023. The Government was to respond to the consultation and publish the revised NPPF in Spring 2023. There was then to be consultation on proposed changes to the rest of the NPPF and on more detailed policy options and proposals for National Development Management Policies (supported by environmental assessments), once the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill had passed through all its Parliamentary stages shortly thereafter. But the Bill is still in the Lords. Lords Report Stage will be on 11 and 13 July. We then have the summer recess (Commons from 20 July, Lords from 26 July) and the Bill then needs to return to the Commons – so there is no prospect of Royal Assent before Autumn 2023. I can’t see how the LURB’s plan making reforms can be implemented this side of the general election.

And yet the Government criticises local planning authorities – and indeed developers – for not getting on with things….

In the meantime, we have little flutters of activity, the latest being Michael Gove’s endorsement this week of a paper published by Policy Exchange (the Government’s de facto policy incubation hub), Better Places: A Matrix for Measuring & Delivering Placemaking Quality, which is an exercise to see whether determining the quality of place making can be reduced to a “universal tool capable of measuring how successful developments will be, (or are) at placemaking for the very first time.”

“The Placemaking Matrix contained within this paper sets out a series of questions whose answers can be used to calculate a score which then reflects the placemaking quality of any new development. Combining the two words of its title and conveniently appropriating the Latin word for peace, the score will be known as the PAX rating.”

“The matrix questions are divided into three groups, those that relate to the Physical, Socio-Economic and Psychological elements of any new development. In this alone the rating system forms a pioneering departure from conventional placemaking practice, while it is relatively easy to define physical attributes and, to a slightly lesser extent, socio-economic ones, no previous study or standard has attempted to quantify the psychological content of places and yet these are arguably the most important when assessing their human impact. The PAX system does just this.”

Aside from the substance of the paper, one thing it really calls out for is some sub-editing and proof-reading. Mark these passages on a range of 0 to 4:

“It is important to note that the Placemaking Matrix does not present itself as a definitive ‘magic formula’ that can conclusively determine design quality and character. While the Matrix sets out to be a universal tool, the localised nature of placemaking will inevitably require adaptation to local contexts and conditions. Consequently It is not our intention that the current set of questions are forever fixed in stone forever. While the paper acknowledges that there are objective, observable truths that define good placemaking, it is not so ideologically rigid as to suggest that a tool such as this must attain pure, unqualified universality. We see our paper as the earliest development of the matrix and we hope and anticipate that with time, testing and hopefully trust from the industry, the questions can be modelled, adapted and evolved to strike the best possible balance between universal best practice and the localised, contextual nuance that also helps drive placemaking success.”

“Furthermore this paper emerges as the latest addition to a Policy Exchange Building Beautiful programme that has attempted to distil the very essence of beauty into an objective standard rather than a subjective instinct, a challenge that now form a central part of the political housing debate.”

So, it’s to be a “universal tool” but (I like this phrase) not “forever fixed in stone forever”. The paper is “not so ideologically rigid as to suggest that a tool such as this must attain pure, unqualified universality”.

Reader, my head was hurting. And then I entered the Matrix: 272 questions, each to be marked on a range of 0 to 4. The percentage score of each of 12 sections is then averaged out. 70% outstanding, 60% good, 50% average, below 50% poor. The questions are quite specific but in large part call for subjective responses. Their relevance is wholly dependent on the scale and nature of the scheme and its location. Some examples:

  • Does the development incorporate cycle lanes?
  •  Does the development maintain a cycle hire scheme?
  • Does the development contain fountains?
  • To what extent do building uses integrate into existing usage patterns in the area surrounding the development site?
  • Does the programme design incorporate opportunities for impromptu street performance?
  • Does any programme apparatus incorporate audio-visual, tactile, sensory or play equipment?
  • What level of healthcare facilities have been provided on the development?
  • Has a letterbox been provided within the development?
  • Will any properties offer commonhold ownership?
  • Does the development incorporate audial stimulation? (i.e. church bells, wildlife habitats)?
  • Does the development promote a visual brand, motif or logo?

Why on earth add yet another technocratic process to the system, to be gamed by all concerned? I would say it’s tick-box but it’s worse than that!

This would all be classic “silly season” stuff. Except for Michael Gove’s endorsement by way of his foreword:

“…it is because placemaking is crucial to the country’s long-term health that Policy Exchange’s newly devised Placemaking Matrix promises to be an indispensable resource. A universal tool that can be used to score a range of elements seen in new and existing developments, it can help build confidence in the wider social value of new residential schemes during the planning process and so unlock much-needed new housing supply.”

“For too long, quality has been viewed by many as a planning impediment. The Placemaking Matrix could help transform it into an incentive. Ike Ijeh’s brilliant new paper for Policy Exchange is no less than a detailed instruction manual for how we can create the good places of the future. I hope it receives the welcome it deserves.”

I don’t disagree with the final sentence incidentally.

Simon Ricketts, 23 June 2023

Personal views, et cetera

Photo extract courtesy of Rafael Ishkhanyan via Unsplash

May Day, May Day – Labour’s Proposed Approach To Planning Reform

Brave timing, with local elections this week, but it is helpful finally to see some detail today as to Labour’s proposed approach to planning reform in today’s Times piece, Starmer’s growth plan is built on houses (The Times, 1 May 2023 – behind paywall):

“Labour will pledge to restore housebuilding targets and hand more power to local authorities; promise 70 per cent home ownership and hundreds of thousands of new council homes. Given the resistance of so many local authorities to development, that may sound like a contradiction in terms. But I’m told a Starmer government would wield both carrot and stick: councils would be made to work together to come up with plans for development at a regional level, spreading a burden few want to shoulder individually, with cash and infrastructure as the prize for new housing. (Bafflingly, they are under no obligation to work together now.) If proposed developments meet the standards set out in those local plans, they will be approved. So no longer would each town hall have to agree to what one senior Labour source calls “shitty speculative developments” to meet targets arbitrarily imposed upon them. But nor will they be allowed to opt out of building either.

Starmer’s government would also look anew at the green belt, swathes of which — including a petrol station in Tottenham Hale, north London — are neither green nor pleasant. Those sites would be liberated. Not all politics is local, however. We can also expect to hear more about national projects, driven from the centre too: intensive development on the 50-mile Oxford-Cambridge Arc and a generation of new towns are all under discussion as Starmer’s aides work up plans to be announced at Labour conference in September.”

See also:

Scrapping housebuilding targets could cost tenants £200 a year by 2030 – Labour (The Observer, 30 April 2023)

Keir Starmer: ‘I want Labour to be the party of home ownership’  (Guardian, 29 April 2023)

Obviously, more detail is needed and some policy nuances are lost in this summary – for instance:

  • We still do have targets, it’s just that they will become even more of an advisory starting point than at present.
  • We still have the duty to cooperate, indeed it seems from a Planning Resource story this week it seems that there may even be a re-think as to its replacement, in relation to housing numbers as opposed to infrastructure and nature strategies, by some vague alignment approach. 

But, really, contrast even this thumbnail sketch of Labour thinking with new housing and planning minister’s Rachel Mcclean’s rather defensive and dare I say it unimpressive appearance before Select Committee  this week. Much unsubstantiated assertion, much “we’ll come back to you on that”. NB Advice to any politician, never question Lichfields’ research – you won’t win! 

See for example:

Minister denies planning reforms will stymie homes growth (Housing Today, 25 April 2023)

A full transcript of her appearance is here.

Turn away if you feel uncomfortable about use of the B word, but… 

I was as unconvinced by her explaining away the current wave of local planning authorities which have paused local plan production as I was later in the week during her appearance on BBC’s Question Time when she became animated in response to someone who asserted that Brexit was one of the causes for this country’s current poor economic performance. 

Recognise the issues, own them!

On reflection, perhaps Labour’s unveiling of its approach to housing and planning has come at precisely the right time (although I won’t let that party off the hook on Brexit either…)

Simon Ricketts, 1 May 2023

Personal views, et cetera

Prospective Prospectus

My 6 December 2022 blog post Gove Gives: Local Housing Need Now Just “Advisory” summarised the contents of his written ministerial statement that day which promised a “National Planning Policy Framework prospectus, which will be put out for consultation by Christmas”.

I mentioned in the blog post a letter which he had written to all MPs the previous day which had gone into more detail that the statement. I hadn’t included a link to the letter. It is here. What is even more interesting is that there is another letter, of the same date, written just to Conservative MPs. The link to that one is here.

The introduction to the letter to Conservative MPs makes the intended policy direction very clear. For instance:

“Whatever we do at a national level, politics is always local and there is no area that demonstrates this more than planning. Through reforms made by Conservative-led governments since 2010, we have a locally-led planning system – for instance, by scrapping policies like top-down regional targets that built nothing but resentment – and introducing neighbourhood planning. These reforms have delivered a record of which Conservatives can be proud. I also do not need to remind you that under the last Labour government, housebuilding reached its lowest rate since the 1920s.

But there is much more to do to ensure we can build enough of the right homes in the right places with the right infrastructure, and to ensure that local representatives can decide where – and where not – to place new development. As Conservatives, we recognise both the fundamental importance of home ownership and that we can only deliver the homes we need if we bring the communities we represent with us. These are the promises on which we stood in our manifesto and ones that I and the Prime Minister are determined to deliver.

I am therefore writing to set out the further changes I will be making to the planning system, alongside the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, which address many colleagues’ concerns. They will place local communities at the heart of the planning system.

As you know I share the views of many colleagues about the current system. That it does not provide the right homes in the right places, and at its worst risks imposing ever more stretching housing targets that are out of touch with reality – leading to developers taking advantage through planning by appeal and speculative development. Communities feel that they are under siege, and I am clear that this approach will never be right or sustainable if we want to build the homes that our communities want and need.”

This Government weaves around planning reform like Kylian Mbappe. First the 2020 white paper, then the u-turn after the Chesham and Amersham by-election, then the Kwarteng “growth growth growth” plan – and now placing house-building delivery firmly in the hands of “communities” – in reality, at root, existing home owners – with a weakened process for local plan examination:

“I will ensure that plans no longer have to be ‘justified’, meaning that there will be a lower bar for assessment, and authorities will no longer have to provide disproportionate amounts of evidence to argue their case.”

Is all of this just another feint, a shimmy past the Tory rebel MPs to ensure that planning reform can actually progress? Or genuine capitulation – genuflection to the election pamphlet needs of political colleagues? Zack Simons doesn’t mince his words in his 8 December 2022 blog post Notes on reform: the Government gives up – essential reading.

The matters to be consulted upon in the forthcoming prospectus are numerous. Steve Quartermain and I were counting them this week and ran out of fingers – the letters include commitments to consultation as to at least the following matters:

  • Changes to the method for calculating local housing need figures
  • Dropping the requirement for a 20% buffer to be added to housing land supply numbers for both plan making and decision taking
  • What should be within the scope of the new National Development Management Policies
  • Each new National Development Management Policy before it is brought forward
  • Detailed proposals for increases in planning fees
  • A New planning performance framework that will monitor local performance across a broader set of measures of planning service delivery, including planning enforcement
  • Further measures (i) allowing local planning authorities to refuse planning applications from developers who have built out slowly in the past and (ii) making sure that local authorities who permission land are not punished under the housing delivery test when it is developers who are not building
  • A new approach to accelerating the speed at which permissions are built out, specifically on a new financial penalty
  • How to address the issue of the planning system being “undermined by irresponsible developers and landowners who persistently ignore planning rules and fail to deliver their commitments to the community”.
  • Amending national policy to support development on small sites, particularly with respect to affordable housing
  • Further measures that would prioritise the use of brownfield land
  • Details of how a discretionary registration scheme for short term lets in England would be administered
  • Reviewing the Use Classes Order so that it “enables places such as Devon, Cornwall and the Lake District to better control changes of use to short term lets if they wish“.

There is a lot to take in here – both what is written and what is between the lines. To try to help make sense of the prospectus when it lands, there will be a special Planning Law Unplanned clubhouse discussion at 4pm on 4 January 2023 featuring various planners and planning lawyers, including myself, Zack, Steve and many more. Join the event via this link – do RSVP in the link and get it in your diaries.

Simon Ricketts, 10 December 2022

Personal views, et cetera

Gove Gives: Local Housing Need Now Just “Advisory”

A deal has been reached between the Government and those rebel MPs who had threatened to derail the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. And so we have Michael Gove’s written statement to the House of Commons today 6 December 2022, in the wake of a letter written to all MPs on 5 December 2022 and a 5 December 2022 press statement. Of course, when we talk about the Bill, that is short-hand for the reform package as a whole, including most crucially the proposed amendments to the National Planning Policy Framework. 

Those proposed amendments are soon to be fleshed out in the National Planning Policy Framework prospectus, “which will be put out for consultation by Christmas” (i.e. by the time that the Commons rises on 20 December 2022). It is going to be thin gruel for those of us who believe that this country has a housing crisis and that part of the solution to that crisis is to build more homes, where they are most needed.  

I’ll just summarise here what the written ministerial statement covers. The letter to MPs goes into further detail.

There will be an amended method for calculating local housing need, which will be “advisory”. “It will be up to local authorities, working with their communities, to determine how many homes can actually be built, taking into account what should be protected in each area – be that our precious Green Belt or national parks, the character of an area, or heritage assets. It will also be up to them to increase the proportion of affordable housing if they wish.”

Of course it is not currently mandatory that local authorities plan for the level of local housing need arrived at via the current standard method, but there is a heavy onus on authorities to justify departures. 

Paragraph 35 of the current NPPF sets out the “soundness test”, including that plans are “positively prepared”, meaning that they are “providing a strategy which, as a minimum, seeks to meet the area’s objectively assessed needs; and is informed by agreements with other authorities, so that unmet need from neighbouring areas is accommodated where it is practical to do so and is consistent with achieving sustainable development.”

Paragraph 61 of the current NPPF says this:

“To determine the minimum number of homes needed, strategic policies should be informed by a local housing need assessment, conducted using the standard method in national planning guidance – unless exceptional circumstances justify an alternative approach which also reflects current and future demographic trends and market signals. In addition to the local housing need figure, any needs that cannot be met within neighbouring areas should also be taken into account in establishing the amount of housing to be planned for.”

It is plain that those circumstances are now to be widened, in ways which are more subjective, eg relying on perceived capacity constraints based on “the character of an area” (the letter to MPs gives the example of for instance “new blocks of high-rise flats which are entirely inappropriate in a low-rise neighbourhood” and talks of the need for “gentle densities”).  It will be open season for authorities and/or local campaigners to press the case for lower numbers to be adopted and/or for the required proportion of affordable housing to be set at such a financially onerous level that in practice chokes off the prospect of development. The proposed abolition of the duty to cooperate and its replacement by an “alignment” mechanism yet to be articulated just increases the plain jeopardy here. Open question: how will the Government be able to hold to its 300,000 homes a year target if significant numbers of authorities adjust their numbers downwards? Another open question: how important is mitigating the housing crisis to the Government versus fending off internal rebellions and having constituency-friendly developer-phobic policies?

Five year housing land supply requirement:

“We will end the obligation on local authorities to maintain a rolling five-year supply of land for housing where their plans are up-to-date. Therefore for authorities with a local plan, or where authorities are benefitting from transitional arrangements, the presumption in favour of sustainable development and the ‘tilted balance’ will typically not apply in relation to issues affecting land supply.

I also want to consult on dropping the requirement for a 20% buffer to be added for both plan making and decision making – which otherwise effectively means that local authorities need to identify six years of supply rather than five. In addition, I want to recognise that some areas have historically overdelivered on housing – but they are not rewarded for this. My plan will therefore allow local planning authorities to take this into account when preparing a new local plan, lowering the number of houses they need to plan for.”

“…Where authorities are well-advanced in producing a new plan, but the constraints which I have outlined mean that the amount of land to be released needs to be reassessed, I will give those places a two year period to revise their plan against the changes we propose and to get it adopted. And while they are doing this, we will also make sure that these places are less at risk from speculative development, by reducing the amount of land which they need to show is available on a rolling basis (from the current five years to four).”

“I will increase community protections afforded by a neighbourhood plan against developer appeals – increasing those protections from two years to five years…”

Ensuring timely build out:

“I already have a significant package of measures in the Bill to ensure developers build out the developments for which they already have planning. I will consult on two further measures:

i) on allowing local planning authorities to refuse planning applications from developers who have built slowly in the past; and

ii) on making sure that local authorities who permission land are not punished under the housing delivery test when it is developers who are not building.

I will also consult on our new approach to accelerating the speed at which permissions are built out, specifically on a new financial penalty.”

Character of a developer:

“I have heard and seen examples of how the planning system is undermined by irresponsible developers and landowners who persistently ignore planning rules and fail to deliver their legal commitments to the community. I therefore propose to consult on the best way of addressing this issue, including looking at a similar approach to tackling the slow build out of permissions, where we will give local authorities the power to stop developers getting permissions.”

Brownfield first:

“I will consult to see what more we can do in national policy to support development on small sites particularly with respect to affordable housing and I will launch a review into identifying further measures that would prioritise the use of brownfield land. To help make the most of empty premises, including those above shops, I am reducing the period after which a council tax premium can be charged so that we can make the most of the space we already have. I will also provide further protection in national policy for our important agricultural land for food production, making it harder for developers to build on it.”

Tourist accommodation/short-term lets

“I intend to deliver a new tourist accommodation registration scheme as quickly as possible, working with DCMS, starting with a further short consultation on the exact design of the scheme. I will also consult on going further still and reviewing the Use Classes Order so that it enables places such as Devon, Cornwall, and the Lake District to control changes of use to short term lets if they wish.”

More anon. 

Simon Ricketts, 6 December 2022

Personal views, et cetera

Ps In A Pod: Politics, Planning, Protest & Prevarication

Planning still appears to have been taken hostage by internal Tory political infighting. See e.g. Tory backbenchers rebel over national housing targets (SP Broadway, 2 December 2022).

In a more innocent time, September 2014, I delivered a paper to the Oxford Joint Planning Law Conference, Heroes and Villains — Challenge and Protest in Planning: What’s a Developer To Do?   

Since then the antagonism seems to have increased and areas of common ground seem to reduced. Planning and heritage processes are frequently just another battleground in this time of global and cultural division. 

I was going to pull together a few more strands today, for instance on contested heritage (I’m conscious that I haven’t yet covered the Court of Appeal’s September 2022 ruling following the acquittal of the “Colston Four”), the closure by the Wellcome Collection of its “Medicine Man” gallery, on the battle for control of the National Trust and much else besides. 

But I’m just going to pick the most recent item from this week’s news. It’s possible  that politics played as much a role as planning in the decision on 1 December 2022 by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets’ Strategic Development Committee, against officers’ recommendations, to refuse planning permission for the redevelopment of Royal Mint Court, near the Tower of London, to establish a new Chinese Embassy (replacing its existing embassy on Portland Place), including “the refurbishment and restoration of the Johnson Smirke Building (Grade II listed), partial demolition, remodelling and refurbishment of Seaman’s Registry (Grade II listed), with alterations to the west elevation of the building, the retention, part demolition, alterations and extensions to Murray House and Dexter House, the erection of a standalone entrance pavilion building, alterations to the existing boundary wall and demolition of substation, associated public realm and landscaping, highway works, car and cycle parking and all ancillary and associated works.”

51 objections had been received, raising a range of planning and non-planning objections. One has a sense of non-planning issues swirling around from the officer’s report which, after summarising the various planning and heritage based objections received, sets out the “non-material considerations” raised by objectors as including:

  • “Concerned about the building becoming a secret police station
  • Concerned about the violent assault of protesters at the Manchester Chinese Consulate
  • Concerned about the actions of the Chinese government in relation to other countries and human rights record
  • All phone calls and fibre optic cables will be listened to as the site is adjacent to a BT telephone exchange”. 

The minutes are not yet available but I understand that the Committee resolved that the proposals would “affect the ‘safety and security’ of residents, such as those at next-door Royal Mint Estate, cause harm to heritage assets, impact the quality of the area as a tourist destination and have an impact on local police resourcing.”

The decision has attracted widespread media attention, not just in the UK (see for instance London council rejects new Chinese embassy amid residents’ safety fears (Guardian, 2 December 2022) and David Chipperfield’s Chinese embassy complex rejected by London council (Architects Journal, 2 December 2022)) but across the world. 

What is going to happen next? The People’s Republic of China has owned the site outright since 2018 and they are hardly going to walk away from the project. Michael Gove could conceivably call the application in before the refusal notice is issued, or China could appeal against the refusal and the appeal would presumably be recovered for his determination following recommendations from an inspector who would hold a public inquiry. 

The political sensitivities are surely going to ramp up, no matter what. Perhaps this application should have been called in by the Government at an earlier stage rather than leave committee members with (1) such a difficult decision, balancing local concerns against international diplomatic responsibilities, and (2) such power. But I’m sure the government would have loved to have left this particular hot potato well alone. And they thought that juggling an appearance of dealing with the housing crisis with an appearance of leaving communities in control of local housing numbers was difficult….

Simon Ricketts, 3 December 2022

Personal views, et cetera

Photo courtesy of Rachael Gorjestani on Unsplash

All Systems Gove

Commentary about the Government’s adjusted direction for planning reform has been running on mist and speculation since Michael Gove’s return as Levelling Up Secretary of State on 25 October 2022, pending the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement on 17 November 2022.

But now it’s all systems go. As well as the Autumn Statement we now have:

The Secretary of State is due to appear before the LUHC Select Committee on 21 November and the Bill will have its report and third reading stages on 23 and 28 November before heading to the Lords. 

The Autumn Statement itself contained little in relation to planning reform, other than to “refocus” investment zones:

“3.16 The government will seek to accelerate delivery of projects across its infrastructure portfolio, rather than focus on the list of projects that were flagged for acceleration in the Growth Plan. The government will continue to ensure that all infrastructure is delivered quickly through reforms to the planning system, including through updating National Policy Statements for transport, energy and water resources during 2023, and through sector-specific interventions.”

“3.25 The government will refocus the Investment Zones programme. The government will use this programme to catalyse a limited number of the highest potential knowledge-intensive growth clusters, including through leveraging local research strengths. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities will work closely with mayors, devolved administrations, local authorities, businesses and other local partners to consider how best to identify and support these clusters, driving growth while maintaining high environmental standards, with the first clusters to be announced in the coming months. The existing expressions of interest will therefore not be taken forward. The government is grateful to local authorities for their work to develop proposals.”

I recommend two good commentaries on the Autumn Statement:

The amendments tabled to the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill are potentially significant. To quote from the 18 November 2022 press statement:

“Amendments being tabled will:

  • Tackle slow build out by developers to make sure much needed new homes are delivered. Developers will have to report annually to councils on their progress and councils will have new powers to block planning proposals from builders who have failed to deliver on the same land.
  • Improve our environment and enshrine in law an obligation on water companies to clean up our rivers by upgrading wastewater treatment works. Considering all catchments covered by the amendment, our initial estimates indicate that there will be around a 75% reduction in phosphorus loads and around a 55% reduction in nitrogen loads in total from wastewater treatment works, although this will vary between individual catchments. These upgrades will enable housebuilding to be unlocked by reducing the amount of mitigation developers must provide to offset nutrient pollution. This will be accompanied by a Nutrient Mitigation Scheme that will make it easier for developers to discharge their mitigation obligations.
  • Give residents a new tool to propose additional development on their street, like extensions to existing homes, through ‘street votes’. Planning permission will only be granted when an independent examiner is satisfied that certain requirements, such as on design, have been met and the proposal is endorsed at a referendum by the immediate community. Pilot Community Land Auctions – testing a new way of capturing value from land when it is allocated for development in the local plan to provide vital infrastructure, including schools, roads, GP surgeries, and the affordable housing that communities need.
  • Enhancing powers for mayors to support them to managing their key route networks and increase transport connectivity across their area.
  • Help Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects such as wind farms and new major transport links be delivered more quickly, by enabling a small number of public bodies to charge for their statutory services to help them provide a better, reliable, quality of advice to developers and support faster planning decisions.”

There are some potentially controversial proposals here, for instance local planning authorities would be able to decline to determine an application for planning permission of any prescribed description if the application has been made by someone who “has a connection with” earlier development which “has begun but has not been substantially completed” and where the “local planning authority is of the opinion that the carrying out of the earlier development has been unreasonably slow”. 

Begun but not substantially completed, unreasonably slow – sounds to me like the Government’s performance in relation to planning reform….

The press statement doesn’t mention an additional tabled amendment, which would empower the Secretary of State to make such amendments and modifications to existing planning, development and compulsory purchase legislation as in the Secretary of State’s opinion facilitate or are otherwise desirable in connection with their consolidation. That’s one hell of a Henry VIII clause!  A Town Legal colleague commented to me that the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee will certainly be interested in this one if it reaches the Lords.

More from me on a number of the proposals in due course.  In particular, I had really hoped I would never have to tackle community land auctions (again) or street votes.

We still await any announcements about planning policy reform, including as to changes to the NPPF and the future of the standard method for calculating local housing needs. We were left to read between the lines of what was said by Levelling Up Under Secretary of State Dehenna Davison in a Westminster Hall 30 minute debate earlier in the week on housing targets (15 November 2022):

“I know I am preaching to the converted when it comes to the need to modernise our planning system, and I think all MPs understand and get that we need a planning regime that is fit for 2022. […] I also understand that Members are frustrated—they are right to be frustrated—that this has been under discussion not just for months, but for years. We need more houses, and that obviously brings with it an obligation on us in Government to be frank and straight with people that building more houses has implications, both positive and sometimes negative. In some places, it will cause tension, and in some places, it will be a source of relief, but it is our job to be willing to have that dialogue, regardless of how difficult it may be. I am not sure that Governments of all colours have always approached these kinds of conversations in the most productive way. The inconvenient truth is that, for the best part of two decades, demand has outstripped the supply of homes.“

“…If we can get our planning regime right, we can unlock a huge amount of economic growth locally. We want to help local authorities to adopt and implement the best planning approaches for their areas. To achieve that, local authorities will need to be able to better attract and retain planners […] and we want to work further with the sector on that. He was right to highlight that as one of the major challenges facing authorities at the moment.

To incentivise plan production and to ensure that newly produced plans are not undermined, the Government intend to make it clear that authorities do not have to maintain a five-year supply of land for housing where they have an up-to-date plan. As Members would expect, we plan to consult on that. The new measures should have a minimal impact on housing supply, given that newly produced plans will contain up-to-date allocations of land for development, but that will also send a signal that the Government are backing a plan-led approach, provided that those plans are up to date.

There is no getting around the fact that we are in a difficult economic time. We face headwinds from all angles—energy, inflation and interest rate rises—and those have knock-on implications for everything that the Government do, but to my mind, they only serve to underline the need to build more homes and to give generation rent the chance to become generation buy. That is why we have to stand by our commitment to dramatically ramp up housing supply and our manifesto pledge to build a million new homes within the first term of this Parliament”

For additional political colour (blue) see also Michael Gove’s keynote speech at the Centre for Policy Studies’ Margaret Thatcher Conference on growth  (16 November 2022)

Simon Ricketts, 19 November 2022

Personal views, et cetera

LURB/Forever Changes

May you live in interesting times.

Resignation of Rishi Sunak as chancellor – 5 July 2022

Resignation of Boris Johnson as prime minister – 7 July 2022

Replacement of Boris Johnson by Liz Truss as prime minister – 6 September 2022

Death of Her Majesty – 8 September 2022

Mini-budget and publication of growth plan – 23 September 2022 

Resignation of Liz Truss as prime minister – 20 October 2022

Replacement of Liz Truss by Rishi Sunak, Boris Johnson or AN Other as prime minister – October 2022

A lot has happened. Or perhaps, in our planning world, nothing has happened. 

We briefly had a prime minister who talked of abolishing “top-down, Whitehall-inspired Stalinist housing targets” and indeed the Levelling Up Secretary of State Simon Clarke (who incidentally came out publicly today as a backer of Boris Johnson) spoke about those targets as if they had already been abolished. But of course, as we wait for the mythical NPPF changes prospectus (delayed to November even before the Truss resignation which could lead to further delay), formal policy remains as is. The only effect of the loose talk was to give cover to local authorities anxious for an excuse to pause their local plan making. Thanks Liz – it wasn’t just the markets that you spooked. 

No doubt the change is on its way regardless but, honestly, how idiotic it would be to give up on having a methodology that identifies each local planning authority’s local housing needs, for which they should usually plan. The likely consequences of removing the targets are clear:

  • longer plan-making processes, particularly the examination stage
  • fewer homes delivered
  • more planning by appeal
  • plan-making increasingly largely driven by promises of funding to be provided and threats of funding to be removed. We can try to forget about that “pork markets” Truss quote but I suggest you retain at hand a much older phrase: “pork barrel politics”.

Zack Simons of course hit the mark in his 11 August 2022 blog post Notes from the hustings: the end of “Stalinist housing targets”? as did Lichfields’ Matthew Spry in his 12 October 2022 magnum opus Standard Method Mortuus Est). 

And what is wrong with top down targets anyway? Our health and education systems for instance are full of the things. 

Away from housing, the announcements in the growth plan in relation to, for instance, fracking (pro – despite the planning minister Lee Rowley being strongly against) and solar energy (anti) have not get found their way into any formal policy changes. 

There was the reference to a proposed Planning and Infrastructure Bill in the growth plan but no skin on the bones of that and no indication either of its relationship to the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, which on 20 October 2022 finally completed its Public Bill Stage with publication of a new version of the Bill as amended in Public Bill Committee. A 134 page list of committee stage decisions on proposed amendments was published on the same day. 

Now Nicola Gooch definitely deserves some sort of award (a Damehood in one of those resignation honours lists perhaps) for delving into the amended Bill in her 21 October 2022 blog post All that’s left is LURB…. The Levelling Up & Regeneration Bill comes out of Committee  and above all for this comparison version showing the changes made. 

I have scrolled through the amended Bill and aside from the detailed changes to schedule 11 (which relates to the infrastructure levy) mentioned by Nicola, and other minor tweaks, I would only draw attention to the following new provisions:

  • clause 111 – power to shorten the deadline for examination of DCO applications
  • clause 112 – additional powers in relation to non-material changes to DCOs
  • clause 152 – prospects of planning permission for alternative development [in the context of CPO compensation]

Next up will be Report stage and a debate on the Third Reading of the Bill and we shall see if any further amendments are tabled by the Secretary of State, whoever he or she may be at that stage. 

Simon Ricketts, 22 October 2022

Personal views, et cetera

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