Growth and Infrastructure Bill
Debate between Alison Seabeck and John Howell
John Howell
I accept that they may not be planning considerations, but they are certainly considerations in whether to move a development forward. The issue is that the planning permissions have been given but the houses have not been developed.
The problem lies not in the planning permissions that have been given, but in those that have not been given. The cost of producing rural planning applications is higher than the cost of those in other areas, and the Country Land and Business Association states that in many cases local planning authority staff clearly hope that the applicant, if faced with enough demands for expensive reports and surveys, will withdraw the application. In practice, that frequently does lead to withdrawal, especially in respect of minor developments: for instance, a proposal costing £5,000 to implement is unlikely to justify information costing £5,000 to produce. Indeed, prospective applicants often simply do not submit a proposal in the first place, which means that desirable rural economic development does not go ahead. This tends to bring the planning system into disrepute. It is therefore right for the planning system to be accused of holding up development.
The Bill is also accused of being centralising, rather than localist. This ignores the fact that the changes are meant to be part of a double devolution. The first was a devolution down to district and borough councils’ local planning authorities. The second was a devolution down to local people, so that they could put together their own neighbourhood plans. Devolution to local people is working better than devolution to councils. At the recent neighbourhood planning seminar in Thame in my constituency, which is one of the neighbourhood planning frontrunners, I was as surprised as anyone when a little old lady said, “Isn’t planning such fun?” I hope that that feeling is occurring all around the country, as people begin to get their hands dirty in doing the planning necessary to make these neighbourhood plans successful.
John Howell
No, I will not.
Devolution to councils is being held up, either because they are incapable of dealing with it or because they are not performing well—neither is acceptable and I would expect this to be dealt with as it has been in the Bill. It is time for our councils to deliver. This approach is all part of encouraging councils, but there can be no doubt that our historical under-supply of homes, over some 20 years at least, is the result of a planning system that is not fit for purpose. That was the conclusion of the Barker review of housing supply in 2004. The Killian Pretty review in 2008 found that only five out of 64 planning applications went ahead without difficulties, with the rest often having substantial problems that either delayed them or changed the nature of the development. According to the National Audit Office, planning laws create the highest regulatory costs of any type of regulation. The Opposition have thus totally missed the point of localism, which was the double devolution down to local communities which are engaging in the production of their own local plans; they are empowered to do so and they are seizing those opportunities fully with both hands to make the best of them.
Clause 4 deals with the information requirements. There is a sense that the clause is unnecessary because other more general powers are available to ask for the right amount of information when looking at an application, but that is utter nonsense. Information requirements are now pretty wide. We have all sat through planning committees where the information requested has been wide of the mark and, in particular, has borne no relation to what might be a material consideration. I am grateful that the Bill has included information that will be a “material consideration” in the terms of the information that will be collected.