The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Michael Gove)
Last week I set out the next step in this Government’s long-term plan for housing, announcing a package of measures to ensure that more homes get built where they are needed most—in our inner cities—while ensuring that the green belt and environmentally sensitive site are able to be protected from inappropriate development.
The Government have a strong record of housing delivery: we have delivered over 2.5 million homes since 2010; over a quarter of these have been affordable homes; more than 876,000 households have been supported into home ownership through Government-backed schemes, including the right to buy and shared ownership; and we are on track to meet our commitment to build 1 million homes over this Parliament.
In December of last year, we made changes to national planning policy designed to support housing delivery by addressing legitimate concerns about weaknesses in the planning system, and to facilitate the adoption of up-to-date plans with clear pipelines of delivery. The further, targeted action that the Government announced on Tuesday 13 February builds on those changes by making it easier to pursue the right kind of development on brownfield land.
Brownfield development
Last July, our long-term plan for housing drew attention to the poor record of housing delivery in London, where housing affordability challenges are most acute. Only 35,000 new homes were delivered in the capital last year, just over half the 66,000 homes the Mayor of London’s own plan identifies as needed each year. That is why I urged the Mayor to take urgent action. When he failed to do so, I commissioned an independent review of the London plan led by Christopher Katkowski KC. The review was published on 13 February and recommended a presumption in favour of brownfield development be introduced into the London plan.
The Government intend to deliver this recommendation —and believe it is important to ensure delivery not just in London, but in our other major towns and cities that serve as engines of jobs and growth. We have therefore launched a consultation on proposals for a new “brownfield presumption” in the 20 most populous cities and urban centres in England, where housing delivery has dropped below expected levels. These 20 places, which include London most conspicuously, are areas to which an “urban uplift” already applies when determining the need for homes. They already have the infrastructure and services for new residents, and they are where we can best maximise productivity through increasing housing delivery. The more we can focus efforts in the heart of these urban centres, the better for our ambitions to level up.
The new presumption in favour of brownfield development will apply where an authority fails to meet at least 95% of its housing requirement. It has strong support from the development sector and will make it easier to get permission for new homes. It will raise the bar for refusing applications and ultimately help more young families to find a home. Analysis in the “London Plan Review” report indicates that these changes could lead to up to 11,500 more homes in the capital each year. By extending the reforms across the country, even more homes will be unlocked.
We also want to support brownfield development more widely, by making it clear to every local authority in England that they need to be more flexible in approving planning applications on brownfield land. To make this happen, the consultation proposes a change to national planning policy that would require councils to give significant weight to the benefits of delivering as many homes as possible where there is a shortage of land for homes. This change would also require councils to be more pragmatic in applying policies on the internal layout of developments—cutting through what can sometimes prove too complex a web of constraints that misses the prize of building new homes.
Using brownfield sites will reduce the need for development on greenfield land and help protect the green belt. Neither of the policies out for consultation affects the definition of previously developed land in national policy and so would not alter existing protections, including for residential gardens, nor amend other relevant policies on the character of suburban neighbourhoods.
Permitted development rights
Complementing these changes on brownfield development, I am also delivering new planning freedoms to enable more commercial buildings to be converted into new homes. Following a consultation last year, we have now amended the existing permitted development right for conversion to residential such that commercial buildings of any size will have the freedom to be converted into new homes, resulting in thousands of new homes by 2030.
I have also launched a consultation proposing changes to make it easier for homeowners to extend their homes. I want to ensure permitted development rights reflect current aspirations for how we use our homes. Our proposals would allow larger loft conversions, bike stores and more flexible extensions. They would free homeowners from the arduous process of going through planning permission for additions helpful to all. The proposals balance flexibility for homeowners with respect for neighbours’ amenity. These proposals will also allow homeowners greater freedoms on installing heat pumps and electric vehicle charging points and will ensure these rights deliver what people want for their homes.
It is important to reiterate that new homes created via permitted development rights must not sacrifice quality. Permitted development rights require new homes to meet national space standards, provide for natural light, and must always comply with building regulations, ensuring that these are quality homes that make the best use of our building stock.
London delivery
In London, we want to go even further to make sure that our capital city has the housing it needs, so our changes in policy are accompanied by additional funding: £50 million of investment to unlock new homes and improve the quality of life for existing residents through estate regeneration in London; working closely with the London Borough of Camden, a new Euston Housing Delivery Group to explore maximum regeneration and housing at Euston, backed by £4 million; and £125 million loan funding from the home building fund infrastructure loans portfolio and long-term fund for sites in east and south London, which will unlock 8,000 new homes. To help tackle undersupply in the medium term, we also confirmed our intention to legislate at the earliest opportunity to remove the current block on Homes England’s role in London.
Support for SME housebuilders
Our changes ensure more homes are built—but we are determined in particular to support the SME housebuilders who play such a vital role in our communities. To that end, we have expanded the £1 billion ENABLE Build guarantee scheme to increase the amount of finance available to SMEs by covering loans issued by non-bank lenders and seeded portfolios. We are also helping to tackle SME access to land by introducing SME-only sales of Homes England land, with pilots starting in the south-east and midlands later this year, and developing a pipeline of future small sites by parcelling Homes England land.
In addition, a number of community infrastructure levy (CIL) charging authorities have set higher rates for minor sites (of less than 10 units, and lower in designated rural areas) to reflect the fact that affordable housing is not sought on these sites. This is not within the spirit of the Government’s policy on small sites. The Government will be updating CIL guidance to make it clear that CIL-charging authorities should consider the impact of CIL rates on SME developers and should not set higher residential CIL rates on minor development. This will apply to new and revised charging schedules.
Public sector land
It is also crucial for the Government to release more land for housing development. That is why we are working with the three main landowning departments—the Department for Transport, the Ministry of Defence and the Department for Health and Social Care, as well as Homes England—which have pledged to set aside suitable unused or unwanted land for housing. So far Departments have pledged to release Government-owned land for at least 15,000 homes before the end of March 2025, and we have set up a ministerial taskforce to assure and accelerate delivery over the longer term.
Short-term lets
All of these actions will help further bolster the supply of new homes—but the Government are also as committed to making the best use of our current housing stock. While short-term lets are an integral part of the UK’s visitor accommodation offer and bring a range of benefits, in too many of our communities uncontrolled growth of short-term lets is causing concern. This is particularly, but not exclusively, where they are concentrated in coastal and tourist areas; affecting the availability and affordability of homes for local people, and contributing as a result to wider homelessness pressures; making it difficult to monitor compliance with key health and safety regulations; and in some instances causing nuisance to local residents and a broader “hollowing out” of communities.
In recognition of these challenges, the Culture Secretary and I consulted on interlinked proposals last year to establish a register of short-term lets and introduce planning measures to provide local areas with more control over future growth. Our aim with these measures has been to get the balance right between protecting local communities and enabling our visitor economy to continue to thrive.
Today I can confirm that the Government will introduce a mandatory national register of short-term lets. That will help local authorities understand which properties are being let out in their area. We will also create a new planning use class for short-term lets. That will apply to properties that are not someone’s sole or main home. We will implement associated permitted development rights allowing for a property to be changed from a standard residential dwelling to this new use class and vice versa. Local authorities will be able to remove these rights and require full planning permission, as they can with any permitted development right.
Separately, where people want to let out their main home for short periods of time, we will provide flexibility and certainty to homeowners that they can do so without the need to apply for planning permission.
Further details of these measures will be set out when the Government formally respond to the respective consultations—including the timeline for implementation of the register, the use class, and the individual permitted development rights. The changes will be introduced from this summer. The Government want a light-touch, low-cost and simple registration scheme and do not wish to disproportionately apply new regulation on property owners that let out their home infrequently. As such, we will continue to consider the case for the potential application of a threshold in finalising the register.
Second staircases guidance
Finally, our focus is of course not just on building more but on building safely. In October last year I announced intended transitional arrangements to accompany new guidance relating to second staircases in new residential buildings in England above 18 metres. As I said then, this is the latest step in a continuing effort to ensure that new buildings are constructed, managed and maintained to the very highest standards.
The Building Safety Regulator will publish the new guidance on second staircases before the end of March, making clear the need for a second staircase in new multi-occupancy residential buildings that have a top occupied storey above 18 metres, and confirming that evacuation lifts will not be called for as a matter of course, providing housebuilders with the clarity they need to progress developments.
The revised statutory guidance, known as approved document B, represents general guidance: it will not be exhaustive, and the design of each high-rise building will continue to receive individual scrutiny from experts, now via the Building Safety Regulator. The fire safety design for any higher risk buildings above 18 metres will be subject to review at planning gateway 1 by fire safety professionals, and by a multi-disciplinary team at gateway 2, who must be satisfied that the final fire safety provisions are appropriate to the requirements of each individual building. It remains the responsibility of the owners and those carrying out building works, including developers, to demonstrate that the functional requirements of the building regulations have been met.
A second staircase will provide new buildings with additional resilience to support exit from the building and enhanced options for firefighting in the rare event of a catastrophic incident. This evolution of safety standards will be a helpful addition to existing building safety measures that we have already introduced and, alongside the enhanced scrutiny of the new building safety regime, will provide people with further confidence in the safety of new homes.
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