Planning matters

Powers to call-in planning applications for more than 150 homes, where the LPA intends to refuse planning permission, will be available to the Government very soon.

In a 23rd March Written Ministerial Statement (WMS) the Housing Minister said (my emphasis) “To provide further support for housebuilding, a new Consultation Direction will be made this month specifying that where a Local Planning Authority (LPA) intends to refuse planning permission for a housing scheme of 150 dwellings or more, they must consult the Secretary of State to enable Ministers to decide whether to use their existing powers to call in that planning application”.

 
These new call-in powers were announced in a Written Ministerial Statement of 18 November 2025. The Housing Secretary said that while decisions are principally for local planning authorities (LPAs) “Given the scale of the housing crisis, and the imperative of building the homes we need, I want to use these [call-in] powers in a more focused and active way”.

 
Accordingly, LPAs will be required to notify the Housing Secretary of their intention to refuse an application for 150 homes or more. Once notified, the Housing Secretary will decide whether to take the application over.

 
The Government has said that there will also be a revised call-in and recovery policy.

 
The Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order 2015 (DMPO) sets out the requirements relating to consultations required before the grant of permission. It says that planning permission must not be granted until 21 days after a consultee (as defined by the Order) has received a copy of the application for their review. From 26th March, the DMPO will say that the planning permission cannot be ‘determined’ prior to the 21 day consultation period expiring – i.e. the requirement will apply to both approving and refusing planning permission.

 
The DMPO also allows the Housing Secretary to give directions to a LPA requiring it to consult any person or body named in the directions, in any case or class of case specified in the directions.

 
There are transitional arrangements, which mean that this change to the DMPO will not apply to applications submitted but not decided prior to 26th March, where the LPA is subject to a requirement in a direction by the Housing Secretary to consult a person or body before refusing that application and that direction existed before 26th March. Therefore, it is not expected to apply to pending applications. The WMS refers to the call-in of planning permissions, which would not include reserved matters applications.

 
It is not confirmed that the direction will have immediate effect, but it seems likely given the transitional arrangements. The revised call-in and recovery policy are also likely to be published before the end of March.

 
Related to this intervention on decision making, the National Planning Policy Framework proposed reforms and other changes to the planning system consultation said “we will publish the government response to our technical consultation on planning committee reform in early 2026, alongside a consultation on draft regulations on our national scheme of delegation”. Therefore, such a consultation - and a response to the earlier consultation - are now due.