Law firm calls for massive cut in London boroughs to deliver planning boost

The London council map should be re-drawn along New York lines so that there are just five boroughs, while ‘metro-regional planning bodies’ should be established outside the capital, a report by a leading law firm has suggested.

In A Forward-looking Planning Manifesto, Addleshaw Goddard said the drastic reduction in boroughsin London would serve to aggregate skills, reduce costs and promote efficiency.

“A five-borough London would pool resources, improve economies of scale and reduce bureaucracy when delivering schemes and services that affect multiple districts,” it said.

“We are already seeing local authorities in London sharing legal and other services, with the tri-borough arrangement between Hammersmith and Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster proving the concept.”

The law firm acknowledged that local authorities’ functions and responsibilities included far more than planning.

“We are not proposing to usurp these, but planning, and the services it supports - housing, regeneration, roads and public transport - will all benefit from a streamlined and more efficient structure,” it said.

“If New York - home to over eight million people - can exist with five boroughs then there is no reason London cannot improve its own efficiency and do the same.”

Addleshaw Goddard said that outside London, the UK council planning map should be re-aligned to coordinate development for metropolitan regions and their surroundings.

The metro-regional planning bodies would plan strategic infrastructure not just for cities, but the commuter watershed around them. “This will bypass the localization of planning decisions, and help solve the issue of under-resourced local planning functions.”

It added that the drive towards shared services had re-awakened calls for the creation of further unitary authorities – “a natural next step is to consider whether that can be extended to other services – including planning”.

The law firm suggested that there was no need for radical reform along the lines of that introduced by the Local Government Act of 1972, (implemented in 1974), which saw a complete restructuring of local government bodies. However, regional and municipal growth needed an overarching and strategic planning tier, it claimed.

The report also said:

• All parties should commit to undertaking a detailed study of the capacity for development within the Green Belt, performed by an independent body that has cross-party political backing. The purpose of the study would be to determine: what the modern purpose of the Green Belt is; how much could be built on, and where, without any adverse effect on the purpose of the Green Belt; and to distinguish different types of green belt land, their purpose and suitability for development.
• A national economic plan should be drawn up by a cross party group chaired by the prime minister, with the plan approved by Parliament, the report said. The critical requirement was securing agreement over what was strategically needed. “It needs to look over the long-term – encouraging regional cooperation, not competition – across the entire country. This would create myriad benefits by avoiding costly judicial reviews and political clashes, by securing cheaper, long-term financing and by reducing risk for investors, lenders and private sector developers.”
• A greater commitment should be created to ‘larger than local’ planning functions, specifically for housebuilding. “This can only be done through housing targets set at the regional tier, because to solve the housing crisis there needs to be a degree of wider strategic planning that can transcend local NIMBY-ism and political point scoring.” Regional or national planning bodies are needed that are able to identify, earmark and incentivise defined zones for housing development. Planned zones would depoliticise the decision making at the local level.
• Earmarked sites that have lain dormant for a set number of years – such as the Royal Docks in London that have not been used since 1981 – should be given away with planning permission to developers who present a credible plan for their regeneration in line with planning policy. A time limit would be set within which development must take place.
• Local authorities should lower the price of public land for the right kind of housing development, such as private rented or mid-market housing.
• The Community Infrastructure Levy should be reformed again as its inherent complexity continues to stall development.
• Civic crowdfunding has the potential to de-politicise the planning process, particularly for small-scale projects.

A copy of A Forward-looking Planning Manifesto can be viewed here.