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NEWS


Planning and building overhaul announced in Budget


Radical plans to reform the plan- ning system by offering revenue- raising ‘land auctions’ were out- lined in the Budget in March.


The Department for Communities and Local Government said it would pilot “elements” of the land auctions models, starting with public sector land.


It said: “One of the biggest barri- ers to development is the short- age of land with planning permis- sion. Auctioning parcels of land with planning permission has the potential to bring forward more land for development, increase competition in development and provide greater certainty for de- velopers. The outcome of the pilot will inform further consid- eration of the wider land auctions model.”


Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said the other measures in the Budget would “get the housebuilding industry building again” and promised there would be a cut to red tape for councils.


He said: “We are unblocking the complex, costly planning system, regenerating redundant sites and putting the brakes on the years of Whitehall micro-management that has tied business up in red tape, slowing and stifling growth.”


The Department for Communities and Local Government will also make up to £210m available over the next two years to introduce


a new FirstBuy scheme that will help over 10,000 first time buy- ers in England, he said. Jointly funded with house builders, it will provide 20% equity to top-up first-time buyers’ own deposits of 5%, letting them access 75% of a conventional mortgage.


CLG will also end the “unfavour- able Stamp Duty arrangements for bulk purchases of new build


homes”, consult on deregulat- ing the planning system regard- ing converting empty offices into homes, and introduce a “power- ful new presumption” in favour of house building on surplus public sector land.


To see the full list of measures proposed by the Department, visit: www.communities.gov.uk/ news/corporate/1871021


10 | public sector executive Mar/Apr 11


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