Planning officers criticise 'standard method' put forward by Government for revising National Planning Policy Framework

The ‘standard method’ for assessing housing need proposed by the Government would be a “huge mistake”, planners have said.

In its response to the Government’s proposed reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), the Planning Officers Society (POS) said the planning system was “not fundamentally broken, but it has been damaged by ill-considered and misplaced changes made over recent decades”.

The POS said a ‘standard method’ was needed but the stock-based method proposed would be a proxy, unrelated to an area’s housing need, and would not reflect a location’s ability to grow and provide supporting infrastructure.

“There are some huge anomalies in the numbers that have been published and these will provide further fuel for those areas that are resistant to growth,” the response said.

It explained: “POS considers the proposed ‘standard method’ to be a huge mistake. As local planners we need to have a conversation with our communities and politicians about housing our population; it is both an emotional and a technical conversation.

“The ‘standard method’ must be based on understanding the quantum and nature of the people who need to be housed in the future and converting that into housing numbers and types.

“An abstract proxy number of homes does not enable us to do that and will perpetuate the anti-growth problems of the past and result in continued failure to deal with the housing crisis.”

The POS also objected to councils being held responsible for meeting a housing delivery test, which it said: “Measures, and punishes, local planning authorities for the delivery of housing in their area.”

It said it was “self evident” that homes are delivered by housebuilders and not by councils, which could only grant planning consents.

The current low level of residential planning applications reflected macroeconomic factors, rising construction costs and construction workforce shortages, plus the availability of finance to build and buy homes, all of which were unrelated to the planning system.

The housing delivery test “is therefore fundamentally unjust and needs to be scrapped”, the POS said, since it would penalise councils for something beyond their control.

If the test remained in place alongside the ‘standard method’ “many more local planning authorities will overnight fail the [test] and have the prospect of handling a myriad of unplanned, speculative housing applications relying on the tilted balance to gain consent”.

That might be justified for a council without an up-to-date local plan, but “it is not justified or fair in the context of the [test]..

“This will increase pressures on already over-stretched planning services, add to the low morale in the sector and the exodus of planners both to the private sector and out of the sector. “

If the Government persisted with the housing delivery test “it must follow that housebuilders should be held to account for not implementing their consents".

The POS said councils should gain powers to compulsorily purchase stalled sites through a revised procedure that would force their sale, rather than the public sector having to acquire them.

Planning reforms’ success was dependent on resources and “all of Government’s plans must be seen through this lens because to do otherwise will guarantee failure”.

The POS said green belt should be viewed as urban containment zones not as an environmental policy, as they were primarily designed to stop urban sprawl.

Development on less valuable land in ‘grey belts’ is among Government proposals but the POS said this “could perpetuate this misunderstanding of the green belt with the notion that there are good and bad parts to it: at the most fundamental level, all parts of the green belt perform well because they stop [sprawl] and, as a corollary, assist in urban regeneration”.

The NPPF should have an explicit ’brownfield first’ strategy with green belt sites reviewed only in cases of unmet housing need, the society said.

Mark Smulian