The Government has published a new bill aimed at delivering more homes. Many of the provisions are subject to further Regulations and there is very little detail in the Bill. Some of the main provisions are intended to:
• Require local authorities to prepare, maintain and publish local registers of brownfield land
• Allow for ‘permission in principle’ to be granted automatically when housing is allocated in local and neighbourhood plans or identified on new brownfield registers
• Devolve further planning powers to the Mayor of London
• Require details of financial benefits to the local area as a result of granting planning permission to appear in reports to planning committees
• Allow applications for non-major development to be submitted to and decided by the Planning Inspectorate where a local authority has a track record of poor performance
• Change the system to allow developers to include an element of housing as part of nationally significant infrastructure projects
• Speed up the neighbourhood planning process
• Widen the range of matters that local authorities can consider where prior approval may be required for building operations
Planning Law