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Government insists planning deregulation measures will lead to more affordable homes
New planning deregulation measures announced last week will lead to more affordable housing and “well-designed” homes, the government has insisted – but it did not provide any details on how.
The claims by the government come after housing sector figures warned that the significant expansion of permitted development rights (PDR) could lead to a loss of potential future affordable homes and poor-quality flats.
From September, developers will no longer need planning permission to demolish vacant or redundant residential and commercial buildings and replace them with new homes.
A wider range of commercial buildings, including shops that have shut down and become vacant during the coronavirus pandemic, will also become subject to PDR.
Part of the planning process involves councils reaching agreements with developers over delivering affordable housing in their schemes.
The Local Government Association estimates that more than 13,500 affordable homes have been “lost” over the past four years through developers dodging the system as a result of PDR.
Asked by Inside Housing if the government will mitigate any potential impacts on affordable housing delivery or the quality of homes, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) said: “The new rules on permitted development rights we announced last week will make it easier for developers to deliver more homes – including affordable homes – on already developed land.”
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It added that the rules will see redundant office blocks knocked down and replaced with “new well-designed homes”.
The department did not explain how it will ensure that the new homes are well designed, or that affordable homes are delivered.
Some flats delivered through PDR in recent years have been as small as 13 sq m – less than a third of the government’s recommended minimum space standard.
No impact assessment for the new measures has yet been published – despite the government promising in a 2018 consultation on the proposals that it would be “prepared prior to any secondary legislation being laid to introduce new or amended permitted development rights”.
Pushed this week on whether an impact assessment has been carried out and if it will be made public before the regulations change in September, an MHCLG spokesperson said: “An impact assessment will be published in due course.”
In its summary of responses to the 2018 consultation, the government admitted that less than a third of respondents believed that expanding PDR to include the demolition and replacement of redundant buildings to be possible.
“Generally, it was considered that such a right would go beyond what is capable of or appropriate to be delivered through a national permitted development right and that it would require extensive prior approval considerations,” the report noted.
PDR allows homeowners or developers to carry out building work without planning permission.
The loophole was widened significantly in 2013 under the communities secretary at the time, Eric Pickles, to allow commercial and office buildings to be converted into housing without a planning application.
Around 60,000 additional net dwellings have been delivered through the policy.
