Labour’s Planning Reform:
What You Need To Know
Zara Moon RIBA Chartered Architect & Planning Consultant at ZMA talks about the recent Labour plans to change planning policy in the UK, and what this could mean for your development
The planning process is a notoriously difficult area to navigate to achieve your development aspirations – ZMA have an exceptional 96 per cent planning success rate and are specialists in sensitive sites.
Labour’s manifesto focused on getting Britain building again – they promised an overhaul of the planning system, increased housing targets and a review of the Green Belt.
Following their election win – Angela Rayner, Deputy Prime Minister, announced Labour’s draft National Planning Policy Framework.
HOUSING TARGETS
In recent years and the Conservative’s last NPPF amendment, there was a slight relaxation to housing targets. All caveats have now been removed and there are mandatory housing targets for each local authority, essentially increasing the required number of houses.
There is a strong emphasis on affordable housing – with Labour stating they want to create the biggest boost to social and affordable housing in a generation. Affordable housing is still only applicable to major developments (10 or more dwellings or 0.5 hectares) and will be dictated by the local housing need.
This could mean local authorities which had met their five-year housing supply needs – may no longer be able to meet new targets, which opens the door to new developments. All councils need their local plan in place and will need to identify specific deliverable sites annually.
GREEN BELT
All local authorities will undertake a Green Belt review to potentially reclassify some areas of Green Belt to Grey Belt or even remove from Green Belt.
The first priority will be Previously Developed Land in sustainable locations, the next will be Grey Belt in sustainable locations and the last priority will be Green Belt in sustainable locations.
This will allow development opportunities on land which previously would never be supported by planning policy.
However, where Green Belt land is released for development and is for a major development – 50 per cent affordable housing will need to be provided.
Another important change is Paragraph 151 which lists the Green Belt exceptions. Exception g) relates to limited infilling or the partial or complete redevelopment of Previously Developed Land. The exception no longer needs ‘to have no greater impact on the openness than the existing development’ and instead the development ‘should not cause substantial impact to the openness of the Green Belt.’
This could now mean that the development, scale and volume is not defined by the existing development on the site.
GREY BELT
The new land classification of ‘Grey Belt’ is ‘Land in the Green Belt comprising Previously Developed Land and any other parcels of land / or areas of the Green Belt land that make a limited contribution to the five Green Belt purposes.’
This could mean development on Green Belt land can now be justified if a plot doesn’t particularly contribute to the five purposes of Green Belt.
REMOVING THE TERM ‘BEAUTIFUL’
The previous NPPF revisions by the Conservatives introduced the term ‘beautiful’, which was welcomed by many. Removing the word could result in mass housing that doesn’t need to look attractive.
The draft NPPF consultation period has now commenced with the final NPPF potentially being implemented by the end of the year – more updates to follow in our future articles.
If you have a potential development and want to understand how the revisions could assist your scheme, book a consultation with Zara to discuss your development aspirations.
ZMA
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Whalley Banks, Whalley BB7 9JL
01200 403840
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