CIH Parliamentary briefing on the Planning and Infrastructure Bill

An effective planning system is an essential enabler of housing delivery, and reforms to simplify and speed up planning processes are a positive step in tackling the housing crisis. We support the government’s commitment to planning reform to boost housing delivery. These reforms are wide-ranging, first being introduced in the updated National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) and most recently in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, which brings together a broad collection of changes made in consultations and working papers in recent months.

The Planning and Infrastructure Bill aims to address concerns of delays in the planning system in a bid to streamline the delivery of new homes and critical infrastructure, and promote economic growth. This briefing outlines key areas in the bill, as relevant to housing, and our recommendations for consideration.

Summary:

• Ensure all new homes are safe, accessible and affordable by requiring compliance with M4(2) accessibility standards (or M4(3) for wheelchair users).
• Limit poor-quality conversions by restricting permitted development rights and protecting the delivery of affordable homes.
• Embed health and wellbeing into planning by adopting healthy homes principles across all housing and place-making.
• Align all local plans and strategies – including housing, homelessness, specialist housing, and infrastructure – to deliver joined-up, sustainable communities.
• Mandate planning committee training that covers housing need, tackles stigma against social housing, promotes equality and inclusion, and amplifies resident voice.
• Invest in long-term skills and capacity for planning, construction, and ecological expertise to ensure reforms translate into delivery on the ground.

Healthy homes

We believe in the importance of building good quality, safe and affordable housing, rather than just boosting development for quantity alone. We will continue to support work to ensure that new homes are safe, accessible, decent and affordable. This work must extend to publishing the technical consultation to progress the implementation of the M4(2) accessibility standards under the Building Regulations. This is also outlined in Lord Best’s Amendment 139 under Clause 52. These initiatives have significant cross-sector support in the housing, health, and built environment sectors, and will provide the necessary provisions for those with limited accessibility to live independent and full lives in their own homes. More details can be found in the Housing Made for Everyone (HoME) campaign, of which CIH is a supportive member.

We also support Baroness Thornhill’s Amendment 134 to limit the damage of permitted development rights (PDR), namely office-to-residential conversions. We recently joined sector leaders in signing an open letter, led by the Local Government Association, which outlined analysis of the harms of permitted development rights, including the loss of new affordable homes without Section 106 contributions. CIH has previously expressed concerns regarding the expanded use of PDR. Whilst there is a clear need for expedited development of new homes, the ever-increasing move towards deregulation through the continual expansion of PDR over the last decade has led to the creation of some of the worst examples of poor-quality and unsafe homes. We hope that the government will address this in its planning reforms and legislative changes.

Health and housing have historically been fundamentally linked in policy and legislation, with research consistently showing the positive health outcomes that come from living in good quality housing and environments. CIH supports the Town and Country Planning Association’s (TCPA) healthy homes principles, which set the baseline to incorporate health within new housing developments. Therefore, CIH supports Lord Crisp’s Amendments 226 and 351, focused on improving health and wellbeing.

Recommendations

• Support Lord Best’s Amendment 139 under Clause 52 to ensure all Spatial Development Strategies meet the needs of older and disabled people through requiring all new homes to meet the Building Regulations Part M4(2) accessible and adaptable standard or the Part M4(3) wheelchair user dwelling standard.
• Support Baroness Thornhill’s Amendment 134 to limit the damage of permitted development rights in residential conversions, to provide safe, decent, and quality homes for everyone.
• Support Lord Crisp’s Amendments 226 and 351 to ensure that all homes and developments design for improvements to the health and wellbeing for those that reside in the area, in both existing and new communities.

Strategic planning and infrastructure

CIH has consistently supported the restoration of strategic planning and welcomes the commitment to encourage collaboration and holistic thinking with regard to planning and infrastructure. This is further detailed in the Spatial Development Strategies (SDSs) for elected mayors through upcoming devolution policy changes, as well as updated local plans in the NPPF. It is our recommendation that strategic alignment could go further and be more effective, in requiring all plans and strategies developed by a local area to be connected and aligned, including plans to tackle homelessness, meeting new housing targets, and supporting vulnerable people through access to specialist or supported housing. This strategic planning approach will be important to ensure that there is a joined-up and holistic vision for new developments, so that new housing and infrastructure are connected to create well-designed, practical and healthy communities, including GP services, schools, transport networks, energy grid capacity, and water supply systems. The development of new towns offers the opportunity to create healthy and sustainable communities from inception. We therefore also welcome the bill’s focus on development corporations, to support the reintroduction of new towns. (We responded in more detail on this point in the House of Lords new towns modular inquiry.)

Recommendation

• Ensure that all local plans, SDSs, supported and specialist housing plans, plans to tackle homelessness, and infrastructure are aligned to deliver for the needs of the local community. This intention is outlined in Amendments 139a, 140a, 150a under Clause 52, put forward by Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe. 

Planning committee training

CIH welcomes the introduction of mandatory training for planning committees under Part 2, 50, to establish clear and consistent procedures for decision making. We believe this is an important opportunity to improve the decisions made by planning committees by embedding awareness of the housing crisis and social housing stigma (prejudice against social housing developments and tenants) into the decision-making process. We would propose that the government include outcomes-focused guidance alongside the Planning and Infrastructure Bill legislation. This training should include information on the housing crisis and deficit of affordable housing, and in turn its impact on local government finance through the costly provision of temporary accommodation. 

Additionally, information on how stigma can influence decision making must be included in mandatory training, to ensure that we build the homes required to meet acute housing need, with the right homes in the right places. Planning decisions are a key contributory factor in shaping whether communities are able to access the social and affordable homes they need, including supported housing. However, there is growing evidence that stigma and misunderstanding among planning committees, as well as local opposition, have a disproportionate effect on the decisions made by committees. CIH members have informed us that local resistance to the development of social and supported housing is often due to fundamental misconceptions about the role and purpose of these forms of housing rather than being based on real evidence. 

The Planning and Infrastructure Bill is an opportunity to raise awareness of the scale of housing need and the vital role that social and supported housing plays in society and the wider economy. The training mandated for planning committee members should consequently go beyond planning law to include specific, non-optional content with an outcome-focused approach on:

• Understanding housing need, both generally and in specific places.
• Understanding and awareness of steps to tackle stigma and prejudice against social housing developments and tenants.
• Equalities and inclusion, especially legal duties under the Equality Act 2010 and the role of planning in enabling healthy, inclusive communities.
• The importance and role of resident voice and meaningful participation by residents in planning processes. 

More information and suggestions for how this can be implemented can be shared upon request.

Recommendation

• Introduce guidance alongside legislation to ensure that all mandatory training for planning committees includes information on the housing crisis and stigma related to planning decisions.

Skills and capacity

Whilst reforms to the planning system continue to be welcome in their aims to boost affordable housing delivery, there continue to be concerns around the resourcing and skills in planning, construction and ecological expertise, which must also be addressed. Local authority planning teams have had significant reductions in staffing levels and budgets, which have ultimately led to reduced capacity and delays in the planning system. Increasingly complex planning applications have also meant that there are further delays due to skills shortages in the area of ecological expertise. We welcome the government’s commitment to funding planning teams to support the costs of local plan delivery and boost training of planners (such as the Planning Skills Fund), as well as of construction workers to enable the delivery of new housing.

Recommendation

• Ensure that the government commits to long-term and sustainable paths for training and capacity building in construction, planning and local authorities, alongside planning reforms and commitments to boosting delivery.