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Over the past few decades, there has been a significant reduction in the scope of what the state believes it (and, as an extension of the state, planning) can achieve.

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New Economics Foundation @neweconomics.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

I was more focusing on the fact that govt uses planning (at a national level) to respond to market signals rather than directing growth to the places that are 'left behind' - which has knock on effects for communities, regional equality, opportunity etc.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

We need well-funded local authorities, able to be proactive with planning powers to deliver critical infrastructure; stop private developers & land owners seizing publicly created value; & coordinate the delivery of housing + services + transport in places that serve communities.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

New Economics Foundation @neweconomics.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

Planning is being portrayed as an obstacle to meeting housing needs, but the reality is that good planning is our main solution when it comes to addressing the critical challenges we face; but we need the government to make this possible.

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Cara Pacitti @carapacitti.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

I describe it as a 'conflict' but in reality it's an issue that the govt is swerving (and I'm not being too critical here, just acknowledging it). In theory it should be a key function of planning at national level, but in reality it comes second to focus on delivery of infra + housing.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

New planning framework out today - excitingly with some changes from the version the Government was consulting on over the summer (🧵thread below).

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Institute for Government @instituteforgovernment.org.uk · 12/12/2024

This speaks to a conflict in planning's 'purpose' - should planning (for homes) follow demand, as the new standard method proposes, but which conflicts with reducing regional equality + promoting growth outside south east; or should planning not follow demand, and direct growth to regional hubs?

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

[NEW] How can metro mayors transform England’s towns and cities? Our report sets out how mayors can play a leading role in the regeneration of disused, deprived and deindustrialised urban areas www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/publication/...

instituteforgovernment.org.uk

Devolution and urban regeneration | Institute for Government

More mayoral development corporations are key to getting Britain building.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

Jim Pickard @pickardje.bsky.social · 11/12/2024

over 10,000 civil service jobs will be cut under ministers’ plans to find savings of 5% to their departments in the spending review ministers are looking at rolling out voluntary redundancy programmes across a range of departments scoop via @lucyfisher.bsky.social www.ft.com/content/3da3...

ft.com

Financial TimesFinancial Times

News, analysis and opinion from the Financial Times on the latest in markets, economics and politics

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

Municipal Dreams @municipaldreams.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

These statistics are crucial to a proper understanding of the current housing debate and the case for social housing - the state is spending *more than ever* on housing but it's spending it on benefits not bricks and mortar.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

Steve Chambers @planningtransport.co.uk · 10/12/2024

Just, and I cannot stress this enough, build HS2 in full.

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Labour betting heavily on strategic planning?

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These changes from the government are def. welcome - just need to weather a period of appeals while LPAs get LPs in place. I do think there needs to be conversations about an 'each council takes their share' approach to new homes, though. Hopefully, strategic planning will help.

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Forgive me but what do you mean by the "Peter Barber boom"?

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Dom White @domw.bsky.social · 09/12/2024

Under supply is evidently something we need to tackle, but discussions around house prices must include increased access to mortgage credit, which has had huge implications for housing as an asset. Some good work on this by Josh Ryan-Collins + others.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

I'm in the 'build more houses' camp. But it's still worth pointing out that real house prices peaked in 2007, which was also the time when household debt relative to income peaked. Supply is a problem, but it's access to credit and willingness to borrow that's bid up the value of the housing stock.

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Reposted by Eddie Millar

Municipal Dreams @municipaldreams.bsky.social · 09/12/2024

This is an interesting and significant contribution to the debate around high-rise housing: www.high-rise-housing.co.uk/uploads/5/0/...

high-rise-housing.co.uk

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I'm certainly not saying we can get different outcomes without big changes. I'm simply pointing out that zoning is not the only way to deliver urban density - there are tools that exist within the discretionary system that could be utilised, but they require political will to implement.

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Acting as if discretionary and zoning systems must result in opposite outcomes is disingenuous and totally ignores the politics at play.

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Sprawl is not an inevitable outcome of the discretionary system. There's no reason that Local Plans and design codes can't effectively 'zone' for density by designating higher storey development in certain areas. Similarly, zoning can be used to preserve sprawl if the politicians wish it, no?

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Far smarter people than myself have done great work on discretionary vs. zoning, and ultimately both have their flaws and upsides - but it's about how they function. And right now the planning system needs support, not ripping up.

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It's tempting to look at e.g. Japan and see how their planning/development system functions and think we can simply replicate that here - it's not quite that easy, for numerous reasons, and a poor imitation of Japan's system is probably worse than a functioning version of what we've got.

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The main problem (as planners know) is twofold. Firstly, planning is reactive, not proactive. We don't actually plan all that much. Secondly, issues around planning committees, nimbyism, and density etc. are political! They are a function of democracy, and require political solutions.

Due to drastic underfunding. Councils don't have Local Plans in place! They can't afford design codes! Developers and applicants can have certainty in a discretionary system. Also, zoning is not *necessarily* simpler nor cheaper than discretionary - we wouldn't suddenly have planning-by-algorithm.

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Well-intentioned but totally misses the point by focusing on zoning vs. discretionary - a symptom of think-tank brain. A functional discretionary system can contain elements of zoning (design codes, Local Plans even!) while retaining flexibility. The issue is that our system is not functional...

Cara Pacitti @carapacitti.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

Reposted by Eddie Millar

Courtesy of the English Private Landlord Survey out this morning - annual reminder that although there are landlords with Buy to Let mortgages that will be facing higher costs due to interest rate rises, over 40% of landlords have no borrowing of any kind on any of their properties.

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We do need to consider how (without a war!) we can reduce individualism and atomisation, but it's been purposefully (and inadvertently) pushed by policy decisions for decades. Inc. in personal debt, household wealth, home ownership, reduction in third spaces... it's a lot to work against!

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It's clear to anyone involved in the built environment that the planning system can do engagement better. This report asks how we can encourage people to actually view planning as a positive thing - don't just make it a binary yes/no, and make the options clear and accessible.

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Incentivise and properly resource councils so they can proactively plan. Reduce the reliance on private landowners putting forward sites for development by reforming compulsory purchase rules. And make sure there is a national coordinated plan for what we build, and where - or things won't change.

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to densify our urban cores. There is nothing more sustainable than utilising existing strong public transport infrastructure, but we need to make it easier for this type of development to happen. We need more housing all over the country, but this doesn't mean we should accept any old housing.

Labour's proposals to reform compulsory purchase rules (removing requirement for councils to buy land at 'hope value') will help this by allowing councils to buy land at a price closer to existing use value. This will hopefully mean less reliance on urban fringe greenfield sites, and make it easier

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The 'call for sites' mechanism that forms part of the Local Plan process is often heavily guided by private landowners. Councils ask landowners "who owns land that we could build housing on" - after all, councils have sold off a lot of land they previously owned (and continue to do so).

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It is not a surprise that RTPI and NEF research shows that new housing developments fail to properly tackle car dependency. There are multiple reasons for this, but much of it is guided by land values, which mean that cheaper greenfield sites are preferred by developers.

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when we have concurrent crises - not enough houses, not enough nature, too much car dependency, places lacking water etc. More than ever we need to make sure planning actually does support 'sustainable' development - this requires coordination and joined up thinking.

At the national level, a national spatial framework would provide a way of coordinating land use between government departments and agencies. At the minute, plans for housing, infrastructure, nature recovery etc. are siloed and don't effectively interact with each other. This poses massive problems

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rather than only subsidising dysfunctional land markets where the numbers for developers just don't stack up. There is a strong case for the state, at a national and local level, to play a much more significant role in deciding where stuff (housing, infrastructure, habitat creation) goes.

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Furthermore, in a world where we have ever higher requirements for homes - energy efficiency, design, building standards - and housebuilders are struggling to make the numbers work (esp. brownfield sites where viability is a huge problem) then it makes a lot of sense to ramp up state housebuilding

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If councils cannot build houses themselves, and the Govt is putting ever increasing pressure on them to meet housing targets, then it tracks that they don't have a lot of leverage when negotiating with housebuilders! Yes, that scheme might not be high quality, but the housing targets need to be met.

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Firstly, much of planning's role is negotiating public benefit from land value uplift on land owned privately. If the capacity of the state is weakened, the negotiating position of local authorities is weaker, and councils must inevitably settle for lower quality development and less public benefit.

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