A rare event happened in the House of Commons today. The Prime Minister, in responding to the Langstaff report on the contaminated blood scandal covering a period twenty years, until around 1991 has offered the victims and their families an unequivocal apology for what he called a day of shame for the British state. Significantly … Continue reading Needs Thought?

The recent decision by the government to remove Lewis District Council’s planning powers and the reaction of the local council to this decision is a stark illustration of a deep rooted fracture in our planning system. Whose authority is paramount? The government whose legitimacy is they act in the national interest. Or local councillors who … Continue reading Local opposition to change

Launch (April 2024) . A general election is due in 2024 or January 2025. Despite many years of housing policy failure in England the outlook for lots of new homes that are needed is grim. Available grounds for believing any of the three main political parties have a deliverable housing policy, which is what all … Continue reading HOUSING MANIFESTO 2024-Common Sense?

Is this a return to strategic planning abolished by Prime Minister David Cameron in 2011? The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) last month published a report they commissioned written by Tony Poulter entitled Homes England Public Bodies Review 2023. Significantly it says Homes England should play a bigger role in leading and … Continue reading DLUHC, or local? Which agency?

On 13 March 2024 the Institute of Government think-tank published a valuable paper, How should The the next government complete the job of English devolution? A serious and sensible piece of work, that reminds me of the earlier, heavyweight CMA report in some regards, more blind spots. . This new analysis of the governance weaknesses … Continue reading Is Devolution the housing solution?

Local opposition is at the heart of our broken planning system. Nimbyism has over several decades shown its power to stop progress . Excessive house prices, weak economic growth, failed levelling up, unloved new builds and outstanding zero carbon targets are all the symptoms of policy failure on several fronts: local democracy, fear of local … Continue reading How powerful is Nimbyism?

Encouraging news from Manchester. The Greater Manchester Combined Authority, comprising nine local councils, came into being on 21 March 2024. Its purpose is to align cross border spatial policies. But it will have no statutory planning powers nor a remit to act as a spatial leader with power to deliver growth policies. The President of … Continue reading Who will decide?

Keir Starmer and Angela Rayner, Labour leader and deputy, have an interesting and rare article in the Times today, (28 March 2024). Rare because the starting point is recognition by the authors that much of the analysis in the Tory levelling-up white paper.is good. Whatever the label means, levelling-up lies at the heart of Michael … Continue reading Levelling up with Labour

Reading the summary of Rachel Reeves, Labour’s shadow chancellor of the exchequer Mais speech, 19 March 2024 about their planning reforms I was overwhelmed with relief and shaken with concerns. My feelings of bedlam were, and remain an odd sensation of suspended hope and oppressive fear. Relief because Reeves did not hit one nail on … Continue reading Labour housing policy: but don’t forget!

Planning minister Lee Rowley said so on Tuesday. It does not surprise me. After decades of confrontational planning of the worst sort, the battlefield is littered with the debris of the war . Poorly located and poorly supported housing, priced at twice the fair rate, plainly designed to the lowest cost denominator, situated without regard … Continue reading Most people do not trust the planning system to make their lives better.