The coalition’s plan to relax planning policies across England could have “disastrous” effects on the country’s environment, said government advisors and conservation groups after a draft of the framework was published yesterday.
Decentralisation Minister Greg Clark unveiled drafts of his plans, in which local councils could “move to a system where the default answer to development is ‘yes’,” unless it would infringe key sustainable development principles set out in national planning policy to be consulted on next month.
But his announcement came under immediate scrutiny, as critics said the plans prioritised economic growth at the expense of the environment, failed to clearly define “sustainable development” and encouraged “speculative” planning models across England.
Simon Marsh, a member of the practitioner’s advisory group for the coalition’s National Planning Policy Framework, said the sustainability criteria outlined in the draft were “disappointing.” He said: “They are using this policy to try and drive growth and that’s fine, but I fear that this presumption leaves us to beg the question, ‘What exactly is sustainable development?’”
In the government statement, “sustainable development’ is defined as the “vision of stimulating economic growth and tackling the deficit, maximising well-being and protecting our environment, without negatively impacting on the ability of future generations to do the same.”
It said the policy should help to deliver a strong economy, protection of the natural environment and healthy communities. But, while the plan encourages planning authorities to “prepare local plans” for new development, they are also told to “grant permission where the plan is absent, silent, indeterminate or where relevant policies are out of date.”
Environment groups fear that this could encourage “speculative” development to be carried out without a considered assessment of the impact on nature.
Paul Miner, Senior Planning Campaigner for the Campaign to Protect Rural England, said: “This proposed policy is as insidious as it is misleading. It’s as if ministers believe that by using the word sustainable no one will think to question any of the details. In reality, this proposed presumption could open the floodgates to environmentally damaging development across the country.
Naomi Luhde-Thompson, planning and policy advisor at Friends of the Earth, said: “This is a total undermining of a plan-led system, where you collect evidence, know what happens where and then put out policies. Ministers are trying to sell this as sustainable development, but of course that is a certain type of development, which integrates economic, environmental and social issues to deliver on all three. Developers need a lot of context and a detailed framework to do that. What was released yesterday offers none of this – it is a massive step backwards.”
