The time taken to make planning decisions has increased by 162 days across some areas of the UK, with Richmondshire Local Planning Authority in North Yorkshire taking the longest at an average of 415 days.
This is according to the latest internal data release from Searchland, the development site sourcing specialists.
Searchland’s data tracks the average planning decision time in days on a quarterly basis across each local planning authority in the UK, with the latest data highlighting which took the longest to make their decisions over the last year, as well as which have seen the largest increase in the time required on an annual basis
The figures show that when it comes to the average time to make planning decisions, Richmondshire’s local planning authority takes by far the longest time of all LPAs across Britain.
The Brecon Beacons National Park LPA is the second longest with respect to making planning related decisions in 2024, taking an average of 400 days.
South Somerset ranks third in this respect with an average time of 398 days, whilst other LPAs within the top 10 include Stockton-on-Tees (376), Middlesbrough (340), Monmouthshire (340), Liverpool (334), Broadland (323), Bracknell Forest (319), South Norfolk (319) and Darlington (313).
Carlisle LPA has seen the largest annual increase in the time required to make a planning decision, with an increase of 163 days in the last year alone.
Broadland LPA sits second with a 130-day increase, followed by Brecon Beacons National Park (+124), South Norfolk (+116), West Dunbartonshire (+115), South Somerset (+112), Stockton-on-Tees (+109), Darlington (+105), Harlow (+99) and Crawley (+91).
Co-founder of Searchland, Hugh Gibbs, commented: “Earlier this year, the government pledged to implement sweeping reforms to help cut the red tape from the planning process, improving the speed at which planning decisions are approved.
“It’s clear that such reforms are badly needed as around half of all planning authorities have seen the time taken to make a planning decision increase on an annual basis.”
He concluded: “If Labour has any chance of hitting the ambitious housing delivery targets set last year, addressing the initial bottleneck caused by the planning decision process is vital.”
