It was telling that Chancellor Rachel Reeves used her
maiden speech from the Treasury to focus so much on planning reform. We were told repeatedly on the campaign trail that planning would be at the centre of this new Government’s agenda for economic growth and after today’s speech, to use the Chancellors words, “
no one could be under any doubt about [their]
seriousness to take on planning reform”.
The Chancellor said that today’s speech would be about stability, she took the opportunity to set out a timeframe for change, aiming for certainty and showing the beginnings of the Chancellor’s “
mission to kickstart economic growth”. While stability was clearly the catchword, she was projecting the Government’s keenness to demonstrate they started to act from Day One in power on planning reform e, whilst promising a ‘state of the spending’ report before summer recess, and a ‘growth mission board’ to meet before the end the month. The Chancellor also reflected that she would not be afraid to make the difficult decisions or suffer short term political pain, perhaps noting the previous aborted attempt at ambitious planning reform following the
2020 White Paper.
The headlines:
-
Consultation on revisions to the NPPF, focused on a new growth-focused approach to the planning system, by the end of July.
-
Consultation on revised policy on critical infrastructure “within the month” and new National Policy Statements "within the year".
-
Immediate end to the effective ‘banning’ of onshore wind infrastructure with a consultation on restoring it in the NSIP regime.
-
Prioritising decision making on stalled energy generation schemes and extend the spatial plan for energy to other sectors.
-
Secretary of state for Transport and Energy Security & Net Zero to prioritise decisions on key infrastructure.
-
New ‘Task Force’ for accelerated ‘stalled sites’ starting with Liverpool Central Docks; Worcestershire Parkway; Northstowe and Langley Sutton Coldfield, representing more than 14,000 homes.
-
Recruiting 300 new planning officers into LPAs across the country (previously announced that this would be paid for by increasing the rate of the stamp duty surcharge paid by non-UK residents).
-
Written Ministerial Statement from the Deputy Prime Minister to LPAs calling for universal local plan coverage and regular review of Green Belt boundaries.
-
Ministers to intervene directly in decisions where benefits to regional and national economy justify it – with the benefit of development being a central consideration.
-
Commitment to 1.5 million homes over the next five years, including more homes for social rent, with an acknowledgement that this would require “ramping up” of building over the Parliament.
“Nowhere is decisive reform needed more urgently than our planning system”
“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”
As perhaps would be expected in a speech given by the Chancellor from the Treasury, planning’s role in unlocking economic growth was given central billing. Ciaran Gunne Jones and Richard Coburn’s
recent blog sets out planning’s critical role in facilitating economic growth, and underpinning public finances. And yet, as noted in our blog, planning for economic growth is largely unchanged since 2012. Instead, today’s planning questions are about the weight given to economic growth for the data centres and power lines that secure future AI infrastructure, facilitating the boom in logistics, emergent giga factories, growing film studios and critical renewable energy infrastructure. Lichfield’s
recent work with Pick Everard found industry leaders are seeking certainty from planning policy and the Government to invest more.
It was therefore informative that already the Deputy Prime Minister has already used (or intends to use) her powers to recover for her determination two planning appeals against refusals of data centre proposals, in Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire. If both appeal sites are in the Green Belt, the decisions will be closely followed to see the very special circumstances matters considered and the weight applied to them.
Alongside this, the Government ‘lifted the ban’ on onshore wind through a
policy statement issued today, part of their pledge to doubling this form of energy by 2030. The new Government will also consult on taking onshore wind infrastructure decisions into the NSIP framework.
As the Chancellor was eager to set out, these changes are happening quickly, and indeed central to all of this will be a reformed ‘growth focussed’ NPPF to be published for consultation before the end of the month. Alongside the major changes for housing, the manifesto promised to update policies to make it “it easier to build laboratories, digital infrastructure, and gigafactories”. This would presumably be designed with a new industrial strategy in mind to support growth in key sectors.
“Getting Britain Building Again”
The reforms that caught the attention of
the front pages, were on housing, and specifically
“the ‘re’-introduction of mandatory housing targets”. Most of the policy areas were
well signalled throughout the campaign trail and the Chancellor confirmed they would stick to the manifesto. Today’s speech set out more detail and some of the announcements on timings that are now emerging as part of a wider set of pro-development planning reforms to get more housing built.
Matthew Spry’s
recent blog sets out the multiple tools (a strengthened presumption, five year land supply, duty to cooperate etc) a new NPPF would need alongside universal local plan coverage to deliver on its aims to meet housing need. Although the ‘where’ has been well discussed in advance (prioritising brownfield development, re-assessing green belt boundaries and ‘grey belt’ land, new towns and the like) the detail on ‘how’ this increase will be delivered is quickly emerging most notably with the new NPPF open to consultation by the end of the month.
The Chancellor was asked after the speech several questions on ‘taking on the NIMBYs, to which she responded that it would be “up to local communities as to where the housing will be built but it has to be built”. But If today’s speech was about setting a tone, the message was clear.
“In an uncertain world, Britain is a place to do business”
By putting planning reform at the centre of this speech, the Chancellor was looking to reassure the industry and investors that she was working to a credible plan for change that would deliver certainty and stability. As Faisal Islam
put it on the BBC, while “
planning is not the sexiest of political issues” it is central to the growth agenda, and he reflected that the Chancellor was aiming in this speech to appeal to international investors, to say “
go for it, now is the time to invest, on projects that will start delivering in a year or two”.
The challenge for this Government is to kick start economic growth which, as recognised today, has been below the rate of our OECD peers for some time. She has been clear that, in the absence of any fiscal levers or capital to invest, reforming planning will be their focus to deliver growth. There will inevitably be both political challenges in driving planning reform, and a lag for those reforms to translate into faster growth.
The Chancellor mentioned working through the weekend four times and that she had been in the job just ‘72 hours’ another three times, it is clear that this speech was meant to set the tone of a hard working Chancellor on a mission to deliver growth. Time will tell if this positive pro-growth tone can be sustained and achieve the ‘economic recovery’ that is required, but evidently the Government are trying to ‘hit the ground running’ to get ‘Britain building again’ from day one.
HM Treasury, Chancellor Rachel Reeves is taking immediate action to fix the foundations of our economy, 8 July 2024
