Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, pursuant to his statement of 22 June 2015, Official Report, columns 617-9, whether local people will have the final say on planning applications for solar farms.

National planning guidance for renewable energy underlines that the views of local communities likely to be affected should be listened to and states that it is important that their planning concerns are properly heard in matters that directly affect them. Local councils working with their communities are able to set out in their Local Plan where developments for renewable energy such as solar farms should and should not take place.