Planning statement introduces presumption in favour of development of free schools

The Government has introduced a presumption in favour of the development of free schools and other state-funded schools.

Publishing a new planning statement, Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said his object was to “avoid councils covertly seeking to use planning red tape to stop the healthy competition of new free schools”.

Promoters of free schools could “now be confident their proposals will be processed swiftly”, he said.

But the Government has dropped an idea to allow some buildings to be converted to free schools without planning permission by changes to the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) Order 1995.

Its consultation produced an overwhelmingly negative response to this idea.

Pickles said the measure was designed to allay fears among those involved in free schools that some councils would have a conflict of interest by being both the education and the planning authority, or that the planning system would be used to prevent free schools from opening when there were no other grounds to block them.

Pickles said: “Councils need to do more to support the expansion of popular schools, so that school waiting lists are not a barrier to greater equality of opportunity.”

New planning rules state there should be a presumption in favour of the development of state-funded schools, including free schools, and that councils should give “full and thorough consideration to the importance of enabling the development of state-funded schools in their planning decisions”.

They should also engage in pre-application discussions with school promoters, but can impose planning obligations on them.

Pickles also said the Planning Inspectorate should treat appeals against refusals of planning permission for state-funded schools as a priority.

The Royal Town Planning Institute said it was pleased that the government had announced that the development of state-funded schools should be carried out through positive planning policy and within the planning system.

Chief Executive Trudi Elliott said: “It is what we argued for, and the government should be credited for listening. We strongly support local authority engagement at the pre-application stage as it allows potential problems to be identified and addressed early in the process.

“We also believe that there is an unexplored opportunity for guidance to encourage communities to use neighbourhood planning as a mechanism for delivering schools in their areas.”

Mark Smulian