Local authorities should actively consider pooling planning powers, sharing planning staff and carrying out much more joint working, Communities Minister Greg Clark has urged.
That call came in a wide-ranging speech which charted key elements of the soon-to-be published Localism Bill.
The minister pointed out that if local authorities wanted to come together to pool planning powers they could already do so. He said: “Indeed, some of the local authorities who have come together in Local Enterprise Partnerships are already considering doing just that.”
He added: “We want all local authorities to think about the opportunities here in a considered way”; pointing out that the legislation would include a new ‘duty to cooperate’ which would require neighbouring authorities ‘to be ready to join forces in the interests of the people they represent’.
Clark said the department was committed to plans for “a clearer, crisper set of policy guidance at the heart of which would be a presumption in favour of sustainable development.
“Applicants should expect to see their proposals approved provided they are in line with neighbourhood plans, local plans and national policies – including, of course, provisions on climate change and environmental protection,” he said.
He said the Coalition wanted to enable neighbourhoods to exert more influence in the planning system than is currently possible. “We aim to create a means for people to formulate their own plans about what their area should look like in five, ten, 20 years’ time.”
He acknowledged that not everyone would want to draw up a neighbourhood plan. “Where there is no neighbourhood plan, we are backing up the community’s right to be heard. When major developments are planned we are setting down in law that developers must consult local people before they make a planning application”.
He said the new breed of neighbourhood plan wouldn’t replace wider, local plans. “In the Localism Bill, we want to make it easier for local authorities, involving their communities, to draw up local plans – and to give them greater discretion to do it in the way they want, by cutting out excessive central prescription.”
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