Local authority planning decisions are set for a widespread overhaul as part of government plans to get to grips with the housing crisis and build 300,000 new homes a year.
Freeing up brownfield sites, residential development of flagging high streets and a £12 billion cash injection into affordable home building are features of a multi-year plan to create more homes.
Today (12th March) changes outlined in yesterday’s Budget have been fleshed out in a publication from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government entitled ‘Planning for the Future’.
In it the Department says it will “act to change” the mainstay of local government planning rules, the Town and Country Planning Act of 1947, which it brands “complex, out-of-date and fails to deliver enough homes where they are needed”.
A Planning White Paper will be published in spring 2020 to “modernise our planning system ensuring it supports the delivery of homes that local people need and creates more beautiful and greener communities”.
Options on the table will include housing-led regeneration of high streets, building upwards on already developed land and stations, densifying gently in existing residential areas and making the most of under-utilised brownfield land, especially in urban areas.
This includes launching a national brownfield map in April 2020 and a call for proposals for building above train stations.
The government will also introduce new permitted development rights for building upwards on existing buildings by summer 2020, including to extend residential blocks by up to two storeys and to deliver new and bigger homes.
It will consult on a new permitted development right to allow vacant commercial buildings, industrial buildings and residential blocks to be demolished and replaced with well-designed new residential units which meet natural light standards.
These planning changes will be underpinned by an additional £10.9 billion of funding to regenerate brownfield land, invest in new infrastructure and provide more homes for local people, with better access to jobs, schools and opportunities.
As part of the development, with investment across five years, the government has pledged to deliver more affordable housing.
This will “help more people to own their own home, and build more social rent homes, helping those most at risk of homelessness in areas of the country where affordability is most acute”, according to today’s publication.
The government will also introduce a Building Safety Bill, which it says will “bring about the biggest change in building safety for a generation” and a Renters’ Reform Bill to provide greater stability for those who rent their homes.
A Social Housing White Paper will be part of the strategy, to ensure residents in social homes “are treated fairly”, it adds, in addition to a Renters’ Reform Bill to “provide stability to those who rent”.
To encourage first-time buyers the government will also consult on a First Homes scheme that will cut the cost of some new homes by a third. It estimates this will lower the cost of buying a first home by an average of £70,000.
The discount will be locked into the property in perpetuity – meaning that future generations will continue to benefit from the discount offered.
Chief property analyst at Yopa Mike Scott welcomes the measures, but says they do not go far enough.
“Increased housebuilding takes many years to have much effect on house prices and rents, even if the government finally starts to deliver on its ambitious targets for the number of new houses built,” he says.
“Easier planning permission won’t help if developers are still limiting the number of homes that they build in order to keep prices up, and we would have liked to see a stick as well as a carrot, penalising developers who maintain large banks of undeveloped land.”
Scott adds he would have liked to see “some more help for the people who are struggling to buy their own homes right now”, in the form of government support to enable mortgage lenders to reduce their deposit requirements and lend more generously.
