Draft National Planning Policy Framework

Baroness Valentine Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Valentine]

I declare that I am chief executive of London First, a business membership organisation that includes property developers. Given the previous two contributions, I should perhaps also declare my past involvement in the regeneration of two textile mills in Blackburn.

I enter the debate having missed the previous debate two weeks ago. However, I was fascinated to read the remarks of the opposition spokesman, the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, who gave his opinion that Ministers had been assailed by the leftist leader writers of the Telegraph and the closet revolutionaries of the Campaign to Protect Rural England. I shall try my best to sidestep the politics of the situation. Much has been said in the press and elsewhere and I wish to take a step back from that.

In a month, the Chancellor will deliver his Autumn Statement against the backdrop of European and global economic uncertainty. I believe that the Government’s general economic strategy is right. Deficit reduction must be a central objective of government policy if we are to rebuild long-term economic stability and growth. There is no silver bullet to stimulate growth in the short term, but a few changes of emphasis would have a disproportionately positive effect. The National Planning Policy Framework is one of those changes. Planning processes have become so costly and complex that too often they act as a barrier to investment. High transaction costs and the complexity of rules have led to drawn-out, litigious processes. The NPPF, which consolidates more than 1,000 pages of regulations and guidance into just over 50, is a move towards a regime that is more efficient in process and more predictable in outcome.

The NPPF should be viewed in tandem with the Government’s Localism Bill. Taken together, they seek to strike a balance between the deregulation and simplification which supports growth, and a greater role for local people in determining the kind of growth that they want. Quicker and clearer decision-making processes will breathe confidence into a development industry far from recovered from the credit crisis. If the economy is to grow, new businesses need new office space and first-time buyers need somewhere to live. Development and economic growth are inextricably linked.

Taking the process first, the NPPF sets a clearer and more succinct default framework against which local authorities should take planning decisions. It should be accompanied by an up-to-date local plan which sets out in greater detail the kind of development that the local council would like to see in their area. This in turn may be further supplemented by the neighbourhood development plans set out in the Localism Bill. The perspective that I am closest to is that of urban London. More than elsewhere, London’s local authorities have local plans in place. They see the benefits of a well defined plan, both for residents and for potential developers.

As well as simplifying the process of planning, the NPPF also amends existing guidance, notably through the presumption in favour of sustainable development. I welcome this presumption, which sets out the criteria against which development proposals will be judged on economic, social and environmental grounds. Concerns have been raised that the NPPF will somehow create a free-for-all in rural England. I note the conclusion drawn by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, in the previous debate, that the countryside is not under threat, and I share his view that these concerns are exaggerated. Nevertheless, while the NPPF includes specific protections for environmentally sensitive areas, such as the green belt, the Government might consider bringing forward changes to the draft to further emphasise protection to important rural areas, as has previously been suggested. On the other hand, there could be further clarification of the wording in the core principles of the NPPF where it talks about land of “lesser environmental value” to make it clear that this includes brownfield land.

These changes could be reinforced by giving planning authorities a window of, say, two years to put in place their local plan, with, in the interim, the presumption in favour of sustainable development only applying to brownfield sites, or planning applications not being subject to the presumption in favour of sustainable development default during that period. Although it seems to me that while the matter of transition has been hotly debated, in fact the proposals in the NPPF are in fact less radical than previous changes to planning policy which had no transitional period.

I should also like to see greater join made between reform to planning policy and other related areas where the Government are considering change. For example, I urge the Minister to co-ordinate the NPPF with the forthcoming Portas review of high streets and the Government’s local government financing review. Planning and other policies which put the high street first, coupled with local authorities being able to keep a revenue stream from growth in the high street, will give councils a palette of tools to support sustainable regeneration in town centres.

The Minister said that the Government were prepared to listen, and two debates in this House have certainly given her an opportunity to do so. I hope that she will take heed of the measures that I have suggested today, regarding both the wording of the NPPF and its links to wider policy. I finish by emphasising that simplifying regulation can be a money saver, an aid to economic growth and an empowerment to local communities, who just might understand what 52 pages of legislation actually say.