New rules 'protect countryside'

27 March 2012 Last updated at 09:37 ET

Greg Clark: "It's very hard for people to engage with the planning system"

The government says that new planning guidelines for England will protect the countryside, boost jobs and "help build the homes the next generation needs".

Planning Minister Greg Clark told MPs the old, complex system "sorely needed" reform, as it had "ground ever slower".

But he said changes had been made to the draft plans and promised to boost town centres - rather than out-of-town shopping - and create "garden cities".

Friends of the Earth has warned of "a building free-for-all".

The revised national planning policy framework was published on Tuesday - and will be implemented immediately by councils with no local plan. There will be some transitional arrangements for councils with existing local plans.

The draft version of the new guidelines reduced the existing 1,300-page document to 52 pages, and the final booklet is just 50 pages long.

Among the amendments, it promises to:

• Help councils which "wish to bring into being a new generation of garden cities"
• Allow communities to specify where renewable energy sources such as wind farms should, and should not, be located
• Allow councils to provide the parking in town centres to "help them compete with out-of-town shopping centres and supermarkets"

In a statement to MPs, Mr Clark said that under old "top-down" targets, communities had begun to see planning as something that was "done to them, rather than by them".

Meanwhile, he said, the average age of first-time homebuyers was "approaching 40" and rents were rising - meaning that families were spending more on housing than on their children.

'Keystone'

Mr Clark said he had accepted, in whole or in part, 30 of 35 recommendations made by the Commons Communities and Local Government Select Committee - including a reference to local plans, drawn up by councils, remaining "the keystone of the planning edifice".

And he said a controversial reference to a "presumption in favour of sustainable development" made clear that that should work through, not against, local plans - and should take into account "social and environmental, as well as economic objectives".

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There are mounting concerns that ministers will unleash a building free-for-all ?

End Quote Craig Bennett Friends of the Earth

The final version made clear that existing policies such as those protecting the Green Belt, sites of special scientific interest, national parks and other areas "cannot be overridden by the presumption", and it would guarantee "robust protections for our natural and historic environment".

It also made "explicit" that councils' policies must encourage brownfield sites to be brought back into use - and allowed them to protect back gardens, while ensuring that "playing fields continued to benefit from the same protection that they do currently".

He said the new framework "will help build the homes the next generation needs, it supports growth to allow employers to create the jobs our constituencies need, it protects what we hold dear, in our matchless countryside and in the fabric of our history".

Critics of last year's draft plans have argued that the "presumption in favour of sustainable development" amounted to a "developer's charter".

The government has been criticised for being too vague about what amounts to "sustainable development" and for saying in the draft plans that the "default answer to development proposals" should be "yes" - unless it compromised "key sustainable development principles".

'Uncertainty and chaos'

Labour's Hilary Benn said the government had made "a mess" of the process, which had done nothing to inspire confidence. Thousands of homes had planning permission but had not been built because of the failure of the government's economic policy, he told MPs.

He welcomed what he called a "U-turn on playing fields and open spaces" but said there should be a national, not local, "brownfield first" policy. He said a planning system should produce homes and jobs but should also protect green spaces, but the new plans "may end up doing neither".

"Far from giving us certainty, there is likely to be delay as developments are held up by appeals and by the courts having to rule on a new and untested approach," Mr Benn said, adding that this would lead to "uncertainty and chaos".

Gerald Kells, CPRE: "Environmental and social aspects should be as important as economic ones"

Opponents of last year's draft plan included the National Trust, the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and Friends of the Earth.

Ahead of Tuesday's publication, Friends of the Earth campaigns director Craig Bennett said: "A strong planning system is vital for building the clean economy promised by government, but there are mounting concerns that ministers will unleash a building free-for-all that will infuriate local communities and devastate our countryside."

He said the new regulations "must spell out what is meant by 'sustainable development' - to ensure the right buildings are built in the right place and in the best interests of local people and our environment".

The CPRE has also said it feared the planning changes would not deliver enough affordable homes - one of the key benefits supporters say they will provide.

But Simon Nunn, from the National Housing Federation, said the new regulations were a step in the right direction: "I don't think it's going to unleash a development free-for-all.

"There's a housing crisis in the country, we're only building half the homes that we need. Planning is part of the jigsaw and I think that a positive planning framework combined with the right investment framework will help us."

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/uk-politics-17514730

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