PLANNING
WhaT nexT? So, what does the new Government propose to do? Firstly, we were told that the RDAs would be dismantled. More recently, we have been told that it may be that where RDAs have proved effective such as in the north west and midlands, they may be retained. This back-tracking doesn’t inspire confidence and gives the impression that the policy has not really been thought through. However, the idea is that the majority of RDAs will be replaced
by Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), which are to be public- private partnerships made up of upper tier local authorities and business representatives with powers over planning, housing and transport. We are told the boundaries of these partnerships will “reflect natural economic areas” and that if businesses and councils decide that the current RDA boundaries do this, the Government will respect their decision – so they could cover exactly the same area as the RDA that they are replacing. Plans for the creation of LEPs therefore also give the impression
of policy being made ‘on the hoof’. At the end of June, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (DBIS) and the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) jointly wrote to councils inviting them to bid to become new LEPs. A version of the letter on the DCLG website said that these LEPs would operate with ‘no dedicated funding for running costs’. Three days later this phrase had been removed. A source from Whitehall is quoted as saying they had ‘accidently put the wrong version of the letter on the website’.
Unfortunately, what we have seen since the General Election –
or rather, since it became apparent that the Conservatives were going to ‘win’ – is stagnation. Since Caroline Spelman sent that notorious letter to local authorities in August 2009, effectively telling them to delay major commercial and housing developments until the Tories get in, there has been an impasse in the system. Local Authorities have had no real will to approve proposed
developments and have, understandably, adopted a ‘wait and see’ approach. According to the National Housing Federation, plans for 85,000 new homes have been scrapped by councils across England following the coalition Government’s decision to revoke regional house building targets.
The yiMBy noT The niMBy The one glimmer of hope for the development sector, however, is that the Conservatives have made it clear that they want to see more development rather than less. In order to do this Shapps stated that the Government would work to turn ‘NIMBYs into YIMBYs’ (local residents who say, “Yes, In My Back Yard”) which should give the industry some comfort. However, in reality, affluent communities proactively campaigning for housing development in their area does bring to mind something about turkeys and Christmas. The way the Government proposes to make this happen is
ViNce cABle
There are rumours of a turf war between Vince Cable and Eric Pickles – David Cameron must show leadership when there are conf licting views and big egos at play.’
The Big SocieTy idea Before the summer recess, we saw the re-launch of David Cameron’s Big Society drive to empower local communities. Brushing over the fact that, whilst on the election trail, Nick Clegg described the Big Society as “hollow and disgusting fake change” what is most worrying is that many people in the property and development sector still don’t understand what it all actually means. Billed as the biggest and most dramatic redistribution of power
from the state to individuals, it represents a radical shake-up of how decisions are made, with decision-making powers on planning for development moving away from Whitehall to local people and community representatives. Around the same time, the Housing Minister, Grant Shapps
unveiled the Right To Build initiative to enable villages in England to build homes without seeking council planning permission. Under the plan, villages would be able to form local housing trusts and hold a referendum to decide if house building should go ahead. Whilst this is all very ‘Big Society’, new developments are likely to be small and, although this is a step in the right direction, it is hardly likely to give the sector the boost it needs or make huge inroads into the ever-growing waiting lists for affordable housing.
by giving financial incentives to local authorities to accept development. Shapps rightly wants to remove unnecessary bureaucracy from a system that has, after all, left house building levels at their lowest for 50 years and has promised a “crystal clear” approach to tackling this problem. What the Conservatives want to do is change the system so that communities are rewarded rather penalised for agreeing to development. In practice, what this means is that councils will, for six years, receive matched funding for any
new council tax revenue generated from the building of extra homes. So the more new homes councils approve, the more money they will get. This is just the sort of bold policy the sector needs and we just have to hope the figures add up. This could make approving new
developments an attractive proposition for councils who are facing severe budget cuts. However, in many cases it is local authority planning departments that are feeling the brunt of these cuts. In short, the more development a council accepts, the more money will be given to them by Central Government. Ironically, this will also mean more work for planning officers.
eric pickles
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