Land Securities commits to £350m development after government announces CIL change

Regulations are to be introduced to stop planning applicants being charged twice under s 73 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990.

Leading developer Land Securities has said that it will proceed with a £350 million scheme, which it might otherwise have dropped, as a result of the planned changes.

At the moment, builders and developers are concerned that they can be forced to pay the Community Infrastructure Levy twice on the same development if they amend planning conditions on existing consents. The government has responded positively to these concerns from the building sector which suggest that important development and regeneration proposals could prove too costly if the Levy is charged twice.

Planning Minister Nick Boles said: "Stopping this unnecessary double charging is an important step in the Government's bid to do all it can to get the economy growing by supporting locally-led sustainable development.  This is just one of many measures we have committed to in order to unblock barriers to growth and to make the planning system simpler and more effective."

Land Securities has just announced its plan to start redeveloping the former Kingsgate House in London’s Victoria Street in SW1 from next month, and the company has made plain that the proposed change in the rules is crucial to its decision to proceed. A company statement read: “The commitment comes as a result of a Government change to planning laws in relation to Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) Regulations. This has removed the risk of a potential CIL being applied on the whole development as opposed to just the minor amendment. On large scale projects such as Kingsgate, the potential bill could have been millions of pounds.”  Land Securities plans to employ about 2,500 during the construction stage which is expected to last until summer 2015.

Even the prime minister is believed to have taken a keen interest in the legal issues behind the project. David Cameron recently visited the site and said: “Already the changes we are making to the planning system are having an impact, with Land Securities giving the go-ahead to a major multi-million pound investment, supporting thousands of jobs in our construction industry. No one should be in any doubt about our determination to make sure Britain, and the British people, rise in the 21st century."

Neasa MacErlean