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Pickles blocks 9,200 homes in build up to election
Eric Pickles blocked the development of 9,200 homes in the run up to the general election, refusing all applications he considered in Conservative-controlled councils.
The communities secretary used his powers to call-in 20 planning decisions in the first three months of 2015, refusing 18 of them, analysis by property consultancy Bilfinger GVA shows.
He refused all 10 applications he considered in areas with a Conservative council, turning down 6,720 proposed homes. The two approved applications, amounting to 454 homes, were in Labour areas, but with Conservative MPs.
Neil Morton, a director at Bilfinger GVA, said: ‘It’s generally recognised in the industry that planning slows down as you approach a general election. Certainly in this election, that seems more apparent than the last one.’
Mr Pickles used his ministerial power to ‘call-in’ planning decisions 20 times in early 2015, compared with just six in the corresponding period last year and five in 2013.
Source: Bilfinger GVA
The graph shows planning decisions called in by the Secretary of State since the introduction of the NPPF in 2012. The green dots represent allowed appeals, while the red are refusals. The outline shows the reason for refusal.
He had only refused 21 of 75 call-ins since the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) was introduced in March 2012 before 2015. It means 46% of all refusals under the NPPF occurred in the first three months of this year. The data is based on publically available information published by the Department for Communities and Local Government.
Of the 18 decisions dismissed, six – amounting to 1,569 dwellings - were recommended for approval by independent planning inspectors before being considered by Mr Pickles. All of these were in areas with Conservative MPs.
Overall, 16 of the 20 call-ins were in areas with Conservative MPs, while two were in Labour constituencies and two were in the neutral Speaker’s constituency of Buckingham.
Nine of the refusals were based on ‘landscape’ – which means they were turned down due to a negative effect on the landscape despite being recognised as socially and economically beneficial. Before 2015, only two decisions had been turned down on this basis by the secretary of state.
Seb Klier, policy manager of Generation Rent, said:‘By blocking 10,000 new homes months from a general election, Mr Pickles is stoking an overheated market, making homes even more expensive and torching any claim the Conservatives have to a credible housing policy.’
UPDATE: 13.04.2015, 3.43pm
Brandon Lewis, Conservative housing minister, said: ‘Planning is a quasi-judicial process, and decisions are made only on the material planning considerations. In the last year, the Government has openly changed planning guidance to place a greater emphasis on protection of the Green Belt and to support the rise of neighbourhood planning – and the small number of recovery decisions will reflect that.’
He said 99% of decisions were made locally, and 235,000 homes were given planning permission.
