21.09.15
Let housebuilders bypass full planning process – ministerial adviser
Bringing housing within the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIP) regime could “relieve hard-pressed local authority budgets”, a report co-commissioned by the chair of a new cross-industry government panel has found.
The report, ordered by planning consultants Quod and law firm Bond Dickinson but carried out by independent researchers, determined that the government should consult on the idea “as a matter of urgency” – in face of a “clear imperative” for Whitehall to show political leadership in “driving large-scale housing development in the national public interest”.
It was based on the views of a wide range of housing and planning experts from both the public and private sector. They found that while there is support for new housing to address the market crisis, this is “unlikely to happen” without new legislation that helps overcome current barriers in the planning system to creating large-scale housing.
One contributing expert said “no local authority is able to deal with applications of a big scale”, justifying the need for a national solution. Another said “some form of intervention” was needed to fix the housing crisis.
One of the authors, John Rhodes, was appointed chair of a new government panel launched by planning minister Brandon Lewis MP last week. The panel is tasked with streamlining councils’ planning processes.
Rhodes said: “Remedying the chronic under-provision of housing should be an economic and a social priority. At present, however, developers are denied access to the national infrastructure planning process for housing proposals and thereby denied the use of the single most effective regime for delivering development.
“With appropriate safeguards in place, the use of the NSIP programme would transform the ability of the private sector to make a meaningful contribution to the national housing crisis.”
The NSIP regime was brought forth by the Planning Act 2008 to consent to nationally significant infrastructure projects, allowing promoters to apply directly to the planning inspectorate for a consent order. The application is heavily consulted on and independently examined within a fixed timetable before inspectors make a recommendation to the state secretary.
Rhodes added that the regime has “proved effective” in enabling these projects to happen “efficiently and fairly” and has been extended to include business and commercial development.
“There is no logical reason to why is should not be applied to assist the country’s greatest development need: the need for housing,” he said.
However the report’s authors said adding housing to the NSIP programme “would not be without controversy” due to some of the “perceived democratic deficits” of its approach to circumventing council planning processes and “often high levels of opposition to new housebuilding”.
But it added that a solution will not be found if the government is “weak in the face of opposition”.
The report noted that the NSIP regime could create opportunities to work with councils and other organisations in bringing forward housing “in the right locations”.
It said that, as the system currently stands, securing planning consent in a “reasonable time frame” is “extremely difficult” without local authority support – and that, even when councils support or promote an application, decisions are hindered because of “the complex range of consents and agreements that are required”.
Because of this, the resources and complexity of assembling land “are likely to discourage” councils and the private sector from suggesting “innovative ideas for sustainable settlements”.
According to the authors, NSIP regime could therefore help address many of these barriers to help accelerate and facilitate housing development as well as “create more confidence” for investors.
The report quoted the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI), which represents planning professionals across all sectors: “Infrastructure of nationally importance takes a NSIP process where decisions are made at a central level. There may well be housing sites of a certain large size or as part of a nationally significant project of mixed uses, particularly where they will make a large call on national funding, that this route may offer possibilities for.
“This would be one option to ensure that housing can command a nationally significant status. It would also provide national leadership, vision and decision making.”
The current chief executive of the government’s Planning Inspectorate, Simon Ridley, also suggested a possible “scope for discussion” as to whether large-scale housing schemes should be accepted via the NSIP regime.
He was quoted in the report as saying: “I’m not yet betting on it, but I think there is scope for discussion as the government works out how to meet some of its housing aims and ambitions and delivery of garden cities.”
Examples of benefits the policy alteration could bring forward include limiting decision-making to a defined timescale; creating a single process even when the application spans more than one local authority area; increasing the certainty of outcome; and allowing for complex projects with different approval needs to be consented to in a single process as a result of the ‘one stop shop’ format.
Furthermore the DCO process would be modified, with the inclusion of compulsory acquisition embedded within its process. This would create a “stronger bargaining position” with landowners, ameliorate local impact and relieve pressures on council purses – as the process would be funded by the promoter.
Kevin Gibbs, partner at Bond Dickinson, said: “This is a national crisis which needs a national solution. The principles of localism are laudable but the current planning system simply doesn’t ensure that local authorities will deliver housing on the scale we need.
“There is a clear imperative for central government to lift restrictions on housing delivery and show strong political leadership in driving large-scale housing development in the national public interest.”
(Top image c. Rui Vieira, PA Images)