Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Gups]

Thought you guys would be interested in this LinkedIn post by Chris Young KC who is a leading planning silk, particularly on new settlements and urban extensions. (NPPF = National Planning Policy Framework). As he says point 6 is the key to overriding local authorties in thrall to the NIMBY vote. If Labour can do this, it will be a quick and cost-effective way of unblocking planning for house building.

The Labour Party has said it intends to make changes within weeks of taking office. So how do they do it?

Answer - Through the NPPF and appeal decisions.

People responding to yesterday's post asked "can a new government amend planning legislation that quickly. Doesn't it have to go through Parliament etc?"

The answer is no. National politicians like to think everything is about legislation. That's because it's their day job.

God knows we have enough of it in the planning system. Endless reform. Politicians keep producing new legislation. They tell us changing it will fix everything. Only it doesn't. Most of it just creates uncertainty.

The real answer lies in the NPPF. The NPPF is what drives housing delivery.

So what is needed is:
1. Mandatory housing targets which properly reflect need.
2. Mandatory targets for the delivery of affordable housing.
3. Every local authority required to meet its need.
4. Review Green Belt, to stop it being used as an excuse not to deliver homes
5. Local plans to be produced on time with the right numbers.
6. Serious sanctions if local authorities do not do all of the above.

It really is as simple as that. And Labour plan to do this.

There needs to be housing targets which properly reflect need. That means higher targets across the country. Not just piling it all into the biggest cities, where there is no hope of it being delivered.

Don't get me wrong, I promote lots of tall buildings in London and other major cities. And I see the merit in Build to Rent, as a vital way of addressing the immediate housing needs of younger people.

But more housing is needed in the shires. It is this which best delivers affordable housing. Labour will change the standard method, so it delivers 300,000 effectively.

But the real key to all of this is No6 in the list.

There have to be effective sanctions.

Only yesterday Tory MP Simon Clarke described the penalties for a local authorities not having a local plan as "trivial". He's right. It's just a shame he didn't say that when he was the Secretary of State for Housing.

How will Labour get their message across?

The NPPF was issued in 2012, when the Government really did want to boost significantly the supply of new homes. To back up it's message, Eric Pickles issued a series of dramatic recovered appeal decisions, including 350 homes on a greenfield site at Worsley in Manchester. The Inspector recommended refusal on the basis it would "seriously degrade" the character of the area (para 21). But Eric rejected that, concluding housing delivery and an up-to- date plan were simply more important.

He then reversed his own previous decisions to refuse permission for both Richborough Estates and Fox Land's big greenfield sites at Sandbach in Cheshire.

Appeal success rates then shot through the roof.

Labour Shadow Ministers know about this.

Expect to see decisions like this from October.