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

To ask Her Majesty's Government what evidence they have on the impact on the housing supply of taking planning decisions at the most local level.

I refer the noble Lord to my Written Ministerial Statement of 10 June 2014, Official Report, Column WS40, which comprehensively explains how our planning reforms, including the abolition of the last Administration's top-down Regional Strategies, have increased housing starts to their highest level since 2007 and resulted in 216,000 homes being given planning permission in England in 2013-14.