Opus Land is one of the prominent commercial developers and promotors of mixed use sites across the wider Midlands region. As such we keep a constant ear to the ground with regards to planning reform and proposed political changes and how that in turn may affect us and our business. There have been some rather radical planning reforms initiated by the Conservative government recently. Namely, dropping the 5-year land supply and removing the requirement to co-operate with neighbouring boroughs. Current planning policy reflects very little in relation to guidance on commercial development and the strategic release of commercial land. This all means that many local plans will start out life in a deficit position in relation to development land across the use classes meaning pressure on communities with a shortfall in housing and employment space.
Come Autumn of this year, we are likely to see yet more change.
We understand that extensions of time on planning applications will be removed, planning officers will have the power to limit the number of consultees on any application to key parties and local authorities will be encouraged to update their local plan reviews more regularly at 36 month intervals. All of this in addition to an overarching (and much needed) endeavour to pave the way towards limiting the extent to which members overcome planning officers’ recommendations at committee hence avoiding costly and time consuming appeals.
Whilst some of these new initiatives are welcomed, the devil is as ever, in the detail and we will keep a watchful eye on how these suggestions manifest themselves in policy. Will, for example, any removal of extensions of time to any undetermined planning applications simply result in an automatic rejection by a Local Authority where sufficient responses cannot be garnered in time. Or will the more regular review of local plans result in less of a “feast or famine” development pipeline?
Who knows but what is clear is that, layer this over the imminent general election and the resultant political uncertainty and you end up in a challenging planning horizon. One where developers and promotors alike will struggle with an eye to the short to medium term to determine the likely success or otherwise of planning approvals that are outside of their allocated use. We therefore believe that against the current backdrop of political instability, planning is more political than it has ever been. It therefore becomes important to approach all of our schemes on a truly holistic basis, considering all influencing factors from a policy, political and local neighbourhood perspective.
We continue to achieve high levels of success through adopting this approach, engaging very successfully with local communities and developing much needed best-in-class development to our region.
We remain keen to continue to build on our planning and promotion portfolio and so please contact us with any promotion opportunities that you think may be relevant to us and we would be delighted to chat further.
In the meantime, from a planning perspective, what this space…….
