Planning Reforms and the Local Plan

I wrote my last column on the local plan before deputy prime minister Angela Rainer’s announcement on 30 July of proposed changes to the planning system.

The most eye-catching part of her announcement was the government’s intention to change the method of calculating the quantity of new housing that each council is obliged to approve.  Everywhere, it seems, the quantity is set to increase, as the government seeks to implement its growth agenda and meet housing demand; but for Wokingham the increase is significant – up by 75% on our current already high number.

The figures are not yet set in stone.  The government will be consulting over the next two months on the proposed changes, including the new numbers, and not announcing its final decision until the end of the year.

The council will point out to the new government, as we did to the last, that our area has experienced large-scale housing development over the last decades yet prices have risen relentlessly.  

New housing tends to pull in more people from London, pushing up prices yet leaving local need unmet. 

The government’s emphasis on delivering more social housing will help us meet more of the local need and is welcome; but whether it will transform the situation remains unclear.

We will also be seeking to point out the very real constraints on delivery on the scale the government wishes. There is nowhere near enough brown-field (or previously developed) land in the borough to accommodate the housing required in the current local plan, never mind greatly increased numbers.  That means more reliance – which no one wants – on open countryside.

The government has said that councils like ours, which are at an advanced stage in the preparation of their new local plans, can continue to work on the current numbers, so long as they can meet a stringent timetable for getting the plan to an inspector’s enquiry.

We will be obliged, no doubt, to take more housing in later years, but if we can meet the government’s timetable, we will have won some breathing space to plan for larger numbers in an orderly way.

As I said in my last column, we will be bringing our new local plan to council for approval on 19 September.  The plan will give us security against speculative developments that we want to refuse locally, but could be forced to accept at appeal if we have no up-to-date plan. 

And given what has happened over the last week, it’s even more important that the council as a whole unites so that the local plan can make its way as soon as possible to the inspector’s enquiry.  The risks involved in delay, whether for political or other reasons, have become significantly greater.

Now is the time for cool heads and rational thinking, for putting the interests of the borough above party politics.  I hope all councillors will recognize their responsibilities on 19 September.