IHBC’s members’ journal Context in June 2025 – No. 184 – focussed on ‘Leaders of conservation thought’, while including Alexandra Fairclough’s regular Law and Policy update.
Alexandra Fairclough writes:
Several statutes and policy documents with some relevance to the historic environment emerged in February and March. These can be read in the monthly Historic England Planning Bulletins. I have highlighted heritage law matters that may be of interest to practitioners and given references where available.
Written ministerial statements A written ministerial statement dated 13 February 2025 stated that applications for development on Crown land should be submitted to either the Planning Inspectorate or the secretary of state for housing, communities and local government, under provisions in the Levelling- Up and Regeneration Act 2023 and relevant statutory instruments. Nationally important developments on Crown land should be submitted to the Planning Inspectorate directly, instead of to local planning authorities. Urgent nationally important Crown development should be determined by the secretary of state for housing, communities, and local government.
A written ministerial statement emerged on 10 March relating to the possible reform of the statutory consultee system. The government intends to consult on the following:
•Reducing the number of statutory consultees (including removing Sport England, the Theatres Trust and the Gardens Trust).
•Reviewing the scope of all statutory consultees, to reduce the type and number of applications on which they must be consulted, and making better use of standing guidance in place of case-by-case responses
•Clarifying consultations, ensuring that local authorities consult statutory consultees only where necessary. Decisions should not be delayed beyond the 21-day statutory deadline unless a decision cannot otherwise be reached, or advice may enable an approval rather than a refusal
•Creating a new performance framework, in which the chief executives of key statutory consultees report on their performance directly to Treasury and MHCLG ministers.
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NPPF update
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… The revised grey belt definition explains that to qualify as grey belt land, a site must either not fall within a Footnote 7 asset or area, or where it does fall within such an asset or area, the application of Footnote 7 policies must not include a strong reason for refusal (see also Planning Practice Guidance paragraph 006,reference ID 64-006-20250225).
PPG updates
The updated PPG states that the purpose of preserving the setting and special character of historic towns ‘relates to historic towns not villages. Where there are no historic towns in the plan area, it may not be necessary to provide detailed assessments against this purpose’. So while historic towns are not defined explicitly, it is now clear that the term does not include villages (Para: 005,Reference ID: 64-005-20250225)…
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… Alexandra Fairclough is a member of the IHBC law panel and a barrister (non-practising). She teaches heritage law at Manchester School of Architecture and is principal built heritage and design officer at Bolton Council.
See HERE for the full article online and in Context 184
Context 184: CONTENTS
Themed Articles
- Editorial: Making sense of it all
- Inclusive, values-based conservation to 2008, Kate Clark
- John Ashurst: practitioner, writer and educator, Chris Wood
- SAVE at 50: celebrating half a century of campaigning Eve Blain
- Lord Kennet: making government work, Rebecca Madgin
- Discovering Jane Jacobs, Joe Holyoak
- Nineteenth-century conservation, thinking from Ruskin onwards, Duncan McCallum
Feature Articles
- Replacing Brighton Museum’s roof lantern, Edward Lewis and Olivia Stitson
- The world of generative AI, Sammy Woodford
- Old buildings and oligarchs, Ian Wray
Regular & Occasional features
- Briefing
- Letter
- Periodically, Bob Kindred MBE
- Out of Context
- The writer’s voice
- Law and policy update, Alexandra Fairclough
- Inter alia, James Caird
- Vox pop
- Reviews, Peter de Figueiredo, Reviews Editor,
IHBC Updates
- Notes from the Chair
- Director’s Cut
- New member profile
- New members
Commercial
- Products and services
- Specialist suppliers index
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