Reforms could strip councils of their say on large or contentious planning applications

The planning and infrastructure bill could see councillors stripped of powers to block building projects in an effort to increase planning capacity and deliver on the 1.5m promised new homes in this Parliament. 

The Times reported over the weekend deputy prime minister Angela Rayner will include the plans to prevent councillors from blocking development of all but the ‘biggest and most contentious building schemes’ including houses, offices, factories and other large development projects.

While the plans could lead to significantly more development, councils warn denying residents the opportunity to use the ballot box to oppose unpopular schemes was undemocratic.

A working paper outlining the ambitions of the planning and infrastructure bill was published in January outlining how it would focus on

“streamlining decisions on nationally significant infrastructure projects, including reducing the burden on developers by making consultation requirements more proportionate, strengthening statutory guidance to ensure they are clear over what is and is not required when submitting planning applications, and ensuring that National Policy Statements are updated at least every five years to give more certainty to developers, speeding up decisions.”

Tackling the ‘archaic’ planning system has been one of Labour’s key objectives since the turn of the year with a series of announcements designed to speed up the system. Just last week Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook published a Ministerial Statement in which he said planning reforms would tackle the transparency and efficiency of local plans in an effort to deliver house building ‘three times faster.’

While details of the bill are being finalised according to The Times, it is expected to overhaul local authority planning committees wherein currently councillors can make their own decisions on which projects are decided by such committees, and which by professional planning officers. The suggestion is Angela Rayner could go further and set a rule that would stop committees from having a say in all but ‘biggest projects and those that most clearly go against local development plans.’ – somewhere between ten and 100 houses and once a project has permission councillors will not be able to influence the housing style and layout, the idea being to encourage more small to medium size schemes

Speaking in The Times a government source is quoted saying

“We will modernise how planning committees work, making sure they are focused on key applications for larger developments rather than small scale projects or niche technical details. This is about making sure the right decisions are taken at the right level.”

Planning barrister Zack Simons KC quoted in the paper said it would be important where the proposed threshold was set.

“Every time you have to engage with a committee of politicians is an enormous risk that could end up setting your project back years and costing you millions of pounds. The fundamental problem is that the way the system is set up at the moment is that if you’re bringing forward a new scheme of development of any sort you have to run it through a democratic process with input from local politicians multiple times. In the meantime you can have a change in administration and it’s the members who were running in opposition to the (previously approved) plan who are now judging the outline application.”

The Local Government Association has written to ministers raising concerns about democracy being undermined, saying

“This democratic role of councillors in decision-making is the backbone of the English planning system and our reservations about a national scheme of delegation centre on this role potentially being eroded.”