By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property There have been a spate of local plans failing, being withdrawn or delayed in recent months. Most recent have been Basildon and Castle Point; the former withdrawing before the examination in public and the latter deciding not to adopt after the inspector had approved …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property Next week’s Queen’s speech is expected to include legislation to reform S106 payments and ‘affordable’ homes provision, replacing it with a flat-rate tariff, according to a report in The Daily Telegraph on 16 April (behind paywall). First raised in the planning white paper in …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property The 2021 housing delivery test results were published on Friday by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC). The test period covers the last three financial years, so from 2018 to 2021 with the housing need based on the 2014 household projection …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property The country has had a housing crisis for years: we have not built enough houses to meet demand for decades, which has resulted in a continually overheated market both for purchase and rent. Not only that, we are also not providing housing for all …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property The Daily Telegraph reported in November that Michael Gove is considering changing the controversial housing targets. It said the minister is looking at how housing need has been calculated as perhaps these are based on out-of-date assumptions. These ‘back channel’ briefings, however, are often …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property The bodies deciding on healthcare provision and developer contributions will change from next April.  The current Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), which have been in place since 2012, will be transferred into new Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) which will become statutory bodies from April 2022. …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property Despite being pushed into the long grass last year, local government reforms have certainly not gone away. Originally in the 2019 election manifesto, there was a brief reveal in the summer last year but this resulted in a cacophony of opposition from Conservative councillors faced with …

By Michael Hardware, Director of Planning and Property  The starting pistol on planning reform has been fired: the Government has today published a White Paper “Planning for the Future” for consultation. This coupled with the reform of local government potentially heralds a period of massive change for local government and developers …