Building GP surgeries, schools and roads is not just difficult it is so difficult, according to no less of an expert on such matters than the Prime Minister, as to be a reason to not even contemplate growing existing towns and cities.
In introducing recent proposals to put “rocket boosters” under construction in existing built-up areas, Rishi Sunak was quoted in The Times as saying that “We need to build homes in the places where people need and want them. There’s little point trying to force large new estates on our countryside and Green Belt when that is where public resistance to development is strongest and where the GP surgeries, schools and roads don’t exist to support new communities.”
It is not uncommon though to see opinion polls from time to time highlighting that for people who are not supportive of more homes being built, building more or improving existing medical facilities would likely change their minds.
It is equally not uncommon though to see stories like this in the press from time to time.
Where is the line to be drawn between what applicants should reasonably be expected to provide as part of making a development acceptable in planning terms, and the access to health and education that citizens should reasonably expect their Government to provide for them?
How effective is the planning system in bringing together all of the actors and agencies that are responsible for the delivery of social infrastructure?
What are the barriers to LPAs spending what the Home Builders Federation reports to be £2.8bn in unspent S106 contributions?
These are questions that I explore with old friends of the podcast Andrew Taylor, Gilian MacInnes and Ben Woolnough and new friends of the podcast James Cutting and Isabella Buono.
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