Sam Stafford's Blog

How to solve the problem of more new households than new houses? Sir Michael Lyons' report of his independent review of housing for the Labour Party makes 39 considered and sound enough recommendations. Planning Minister Brandon Lewis has summarised the Government's "wide range of measures" as including neighbourhood planning ('putting power back in the hands of local communities'), investment in the Affordable Homes programme, and the stimulation of demand (like 'Help to Buy'). Shadow Communities Minister Roberta Blackman-Woods has spoken of "tweaks" to the NPPF to reflect a 'brownfield first' policy (and also a common methodology for objective assessments of housing need), sentiments also expressed by Brandon Lewis in response to a recent CPRE report . Whilst the Lyons' report mentions "housing as a priority for Government", regardless of who forms the next Government the smart money (I'd he...

We are in election season, which means that planning policies and pronouncements are more prone than usual to the pie charts of public opinion. It occurs to me, therefore, that planning is ripe for satirical send-up, so this blog, therefore, is meant for Armando Iannucci, who will hopefully at some point in the future consider a fifth series of The Thick Of It, the razor-sharp, foul-mouthed satire that pricks at the Westminster bubble. If, and hopefully when, Mr Iannucci does contemplate that new series, he will hopefully stumble across this piece and my suggestion that Nicola Murray, the tragi-comic Minister whose sole ambition in politics is to avoid the ire of tyrannical spin-doctor Malcolm Tucker, finds her way from DoSAC to the new Department of Places and the Environment where she has accepted the crucial role of Planning Minister. To assist Mr Iannucci yet further, I have also taken the liberty of sketching out a planning narrative for the series, around...

Morecambe and Wise. Shearer and Sheringham. Green Belt and Brownfield. Partnerships that are famous because you cannot think of one without thinking of the other. Having reinforced the Government's commitment to the Green Belt last month , it was perhaps inevitable that this month would see a similar commitment from Housing & Planning Minister Brandon Lewis to brownfield sites, the supply of which, as I heard recently, becomes more elastic the closer time gets to a general election. Sure enough, Mr Lewis lent his name to a CPRE press release about it's ' Wasted Space ' campaign. Labour too is keen to emphasise it's pre-election brownfield credentials, and I recently heard Shadow Minister Roberta Blackman-Woods reinforce a ' brownfield first ' message that was first aired by Hilary Benn some time ago.  Nobody would disagree that brownfield sites should be developed before greenfield ones, but this, unfortunately, is where the public prono...

If the general election of 2010 was about localism, the 2015 election promises to be about devolution. If it’s not on the lips of everybody then it’s certainly on the lips of the metropolitan, liberal elite that concerns itself with the future of regional governance. The Conservatives’s ‘ Northern Powerhouse’ ; the five cities’ ‘ One North ’ plan; Nick Clegg’s ‘ Northern Futures’ project; the City Growth Commission’s ‘ Unleashing Metro Growth ’ report; Labour’s plans for an English Regional Cabinet Committee ; and David Higgins’ ‘ Rebalancing Britain’ report, are all evidence of a devolution arms race. "New transport and science and powerful city governance", said George Osborne . "Better connections between people and jobs is crucial if we want to rebalance the national economy", said Keith Wakefield . "The next phase in our drive to generate the best ideas for stronger local growth", said Nick Clegg . 'Granting more powers to cities should...

In a Telegraph piece today (10 November) Redrow Chairman Steve Morgan bemoans the "political posturing ahead of next year's General Election (that) is already having a detrimental impact on the time taken to grant planning permissions in many parts of the country." To what might Mr Morgan be referring to? Well last month ministers "underlined the government’s commitment to protect the green belt from development" with 'new' guidance  and, predcitably enough, two Surrey councils have already shelved plans for a Green Belt review.   Practioners though are seeing through the smoke and mirrors. This is an extract from a piece by Stephen Ashworth at Dentons. In substance, neither additional paragraph makes any real contribution to our understanding of the policy in the NPPF. However, the ministerial statements that introduce the additions to the NPPG have given the impression that green belt policy has been tightened and that greater favou...

Of all the challenges awaiting the first directly-elected mayor of Greater Manchester in 2017, and there will no doubt be plenty, the one that drew my eye amongst the 'devo-manc' coverage (3 November 2014) was the need for the Spatial Framework to be approved 'by a unanimous vote of the Mayor’s Cabinet' ( here ). John Geoghegan at Planning Magazine has been told by Eamonn Boylan at Stockport Council ( here ) that the Cabinet would retain the GMCA model, which means that it will comprise all ten Council leaders. According to the Spatial Framework consultation material, 2017 should herald a 'publication' draft of the new statutory document, as well as it's submission for examination. Even without a unanimous cabinet vote that is an extremely ambitious timetable because it means plan publication either before or very soon after an election in May, cabinet consent to the submission of the plan in the summer, and an examination by Christmas. The need for unani...