Policy News

Wednesday 24 February 2010

David Cameron has launched the Conservatives‘ planning green paper focusing on sustainable development

Conservative leader David Cameron yesterday (February 23) launched his Party's planning green paper which outlines proposals to get neighbourhoods involved in planning decisions in order to encourage sustainable development.

And, the shadow prime minister reaffirmed the Conservatives view that communities that choose to host wind farms should keep the business rates they generate for six years, in an attempt to develop broad public support for the process.

Yesterday's planning green paper, entitled ‘Open Source Planning', claims England's planning system is broken and needs reform. It aims to scrap Whitehall targets and unelected quangos and replace them with a democratic system for national infrastructure and incentives to promote local homes and jobs.

Under open source planning, the Conservatives hope to create a planning system where there is a basic national framework of planning priorities and policies, within which local people and their accountable local governments can produce their own distinctive local policies to create communities which are sustainable, attractive and good to live in.

This is in contrast, the Party says, to the current system where one planning structure is determined centrally and then applied unvaryingly across the country.

Launching the paper, Mr Cameron said that the plans show "how a system that was controlled by a few can be run by the many".

Wind farms

One of the issues touched upon in the paper is that in order for Britain to capitalise on "some of the best renewable resources in the world", it is vital that broad public support is developed in the planning process.

It notes that onshore wind farms are not appropriate in all settings and that local community consent is critical, with communities able to be active participants in, and beneficiaries of, onshore wind development - an issue first raised by shadow energy secretary Greg Clark in November 2009 (see this NewEnergyFocus.com story).

According to the paper, Conservative policy would allow communities that choose to host wind farms to keep the business rates they generate for six years. The Party also claims to be examining how community ownership of wind turbines can be introduced and how discounted electricity can be available to communities in the vicinity of wind farms.

"This is the sort of fresh thinking that will be required to increase acceptance of wind farms", the Paper states.
Other measures outlined in the planning green paper include:

• Commitment to allow neighbourhoods to keep some of the money contributed by developers to councils at the time when planning approval is given;
• Establish a democratically accountable version of the major infrastructure planning system introduced by Labour - providing a parallel at national level to the local accountability and civic engagement - to allow for timely development of infrastructure projects of national importance, such as major energy projects.;
• Abolish the unelected Infrastructure Planning Commission whilst retaining its expertise and fast-track process within government;
• Ensure all other major infrastructure projects like power stations are considered at planning inquiries which have binding timetables so that they are not held up by discussions of wider policy.

Commenting on the proposals, Caroline Spelman, shadow Communities and Local Government secretary, said: "Too many decisions are taken by unelected quangos, there is too much unnecessary red tape and there are no incentives for local residents to back sustainable development. We will put local communities in the driving seat."

CBI

Responding to today's paper, the CBI - the UK's leading business organisation which speaks for 240,000 businesses - agreed that the current planning system is broken but claimed it remains to be seen whether the Conservatives proposals will fix it.

John Cridland, CBI deputy director-general, said: "For the country to enjoy healthy economic growth, we need an effective planning system, and business will judge any incoming government on whether it can make the planning system deliver on time.

"We must replace the UK's ageing energy infrastructure before the lights go out as a priority, and the Conservative proposals should be judged on their ability to fast track this kind of development."

He added: "We welcome the presumption in favour of approving sustainable planning applications, and the financial incentives for local authorities to encourage development. However, given the natural tendency of constituents to oppose development, it is doubtful that even these incentives are enough."