Five ways the Planning and Infrastructure Bill needs improving
The Planning and Infrastructure Bill has now finished its Committee stage, where a committee of MPs scrutinise the Bill line by line. We’ve welcomed parts of the Bill but Better Planning Coalition members still have concerns about the Bill (and the associated regulations and guidance needed to implement it).
Here’s five ways we think it needs to be improved before it comes back before the House of Commons at Report stage on 9 June.
- Consultation in the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Regime: The Bill scraps statutory consultation at the pre-application stage for major infrastructure. The Government says it still wants to encourage consultation but to allow more flexibility on how this is done, and will encourage this with statutory guidance on consultation. Ministers need to provide details of this guidance during the Bill’s passage so MPs and peers know what the full implications of this change are.
- National Scheme of Delegation: We believe that greater consistency and improved quality in local planning committees is needed but a legally binding national scheme of delegation setting out exactly what committees of elected councillors are allowed to decide on is too prescriptive. This risks undermining local democratic accountability and public trust in the planning system. If the Government remains committed to a legally binding national scheme, then it should still enable large and controversial schemes to be referred to local council planning committees. The details of the Government’s proposals need to be consulted on as soon as possible.
- National spatial policies and climate change: We are very supportive of the Bill’s introduction of strategic planning at a sub-regional level. Strategic planning will be vital in managing the increasing demand on land for housing, infrastructure, nature, flood management, food production, renewable energy, energy crops and woodland creation. However, at the moment we’ve yet to see how different departments’ spatial policy frameworks join up with this new layer beyond duties to have regard to some strategies or plans (eg Defra’s Land Use Framework; Department for Transport’s Integrated National Transport Strategy; and DESNZ’s Strategic Spatial Energy Plan and Centralised Strategic Network Plan). And all of these need to help the UK’s pathway to net zero emissions, responding to the Climate Change Committee’s consistent calls for embedding Net Zero alignment as a core requirement within planning reforms. We hope that the Government will look at adding a duty on the Secretary of State and planning bodies to have special regard to the mitigation of, and adaptation to, climate change in their functions and provide clarity on how national spatial policies join up with sub-regional strategies.
- Strategic planning and consultation: The Bill Committee was much exercised by concerns about engagement and consultation on new spatial development strategies, and the failure to include a right to be heard. The Minister said that he would reflect on the strength of opinion on this and we trust that reassurances will be made at Report stage or in the Lords on this.
- Nature Recovery Fund: Defra and MHCLG ministers have said they will reflect on the concerns from the Office for Environmental Protection, which our members share about the major changes to environmental law in the Bill. New environmental delivery plans will allow for environmental protection laws to be disapplied in some cases if payments are made by developers to fund improvements for nature elsewhere. We look forward to movement on this at Report stage and are backing Wildlife and Countryside’s calls for specific changes to the Bill.
Addressing these issues would show that the Government has a clear vision for planning and development that serves the public interest. We’ll be briefing MPs at Report stage on the changes we would like to see and working with peers when the Bill goes to the Lords in late June.