Simple problem, difficult answer

We haven’t been building enough. Although it’s not the only culprit behind outrageous house prices, it’s the most conspicuous one. Sort out house prices, and a lot of other things go some way to sorting themselves out.
We also have an issue with failing infrastructure and apparent inability to build more without astonishing cost and time and incredible piles of paperwork. These are related in one single problem: planning is a broken process.

It’s a simple problem to state. But not simple to fix. It’s easier to come up with a simplistic narrative to fit our preconceptions, shout about it, insist it’s simple to fix with just a single bound, and then go and do something else whilst nothing gets fixed.

A bit harsh?

Maybe, but that was where I was a while back. Before I got involved in the planning morass. And yes, it is a morass – but not one that lends itself to being drained in a simple manner.

Bypass NIMBY Councillors!

A recent example: Angela Rayner “calling in” an application for 8,400 homes just before going to committee. “Damn right!” “NIMBY Councillors – bound to reject it!”

Yes, they were almost certainly going to reject it… the clue is in “recommendation for refusal.” Planning Officers had compared it to the compulsory body of legislation and determined that it was a “No.” Which, unless they could find some loophole, meant they were mandated to reject. It’s a bloody stupid process when you dictate the decision that has to be made (through legislation) and then overrule it because it’s not the one you wanted! How about not dictating that decision in the first place?

Into the Slough of Despond Process

Ah, but she’s rewriting that legislation. That’ll fix it.

Will it? She’s consulting on changes to the National Planning Policy Framework. Local Plans (made to localise these requirements) will remain required, albeit under this revised framework. The existing, exhaustive (and exhausting) body of prior case law and precedent will still exist. And she’s falling into the eternal (and very hard to avoid) trap of good ideas. Take a look here:

There are loads of good ideas in there – but it means the new NPPF will be as huge and cumbersome as before. Every idea, every extra step, is more complexity, and less room for manouevre. It’s the “Process State.”

But why?

It’s a Process State for a reason. Well, two reasons.

The first is to avoid councillors rejecting (or approving) things for local popularity. I mean, it doesn’t stop everyone assuming that’s exactly what happens; it’s one of the easiest ways to resolve anger over the process. But Planning Committees have got astonishingly little room for manoeuvre, and if something ticks the boxes for approval, it either gets approved there, or on appeal.

The second is that developers can be like private car park operators. They’ll take the piss over every ambiguity, element of subjectivity, and loophole. Leading to legal challenges, resulting in decisions, giving precedents, resulting in “the prior body of case law.”

That snowballs over the decades and is now huge. The NPPF (and the Local Plans that spin out of it) are full of “should” and “should not” statements. Where does “should” become “must” and where is it “okay, maybe not”? You “should” carry out a “meaningful start” on building in a certain timeframe – what is a “meaningful start?” Conditions “should be appropriate.” What’s “appropriate?” Enforcement “should” allow for “reasonable” efforts… and so on. All of this has been explored and given (sometimes conflicting) precedents.

More and more paperwork comes out clarifying every little element and removing subjectivity wherever possible and chasing those precedents. This leads to the sclerotic process and legislative framework that we have instead.

Get rid of it, then!

So – sweep it all away!

But that ignores externalities, which are real and can’t be ignored. Make an entry/exit road going onto the bend of a main road causing chaos and crashes? Build on a flood plain? Bulldoze archaeological sites? Of course not, we’d write something to prevent those.

Build sites where people have no choice but to drive everywhere whilst we talk about shifting to other modes of transport? Build estates where crime is effectively designed in? Allow ribbon development to merge towns? Get rid of sports fields, parks, recreation facilities? Build places where disabled people have no chance to live there? Here’s where we argue over good ideas and the better being the enemy of the good.

Have no flood mitigation or SUDS? Ignore sewerage capacity? Build an open cast mine in the middle of a city? Of course not, we’d write something to forbid those…

Right back where we started

Now you’ve got an NPPF all over again. And you’ll end up going back through the courts to recreate that body of case law (the lawyers will re-run the arguments that got those precedents the first time around). You’ve swept it away… and rebuilt the same thing.

Or shall we forget about all of that and step away from the Process State and give local politicians free rein to decide what gets built and where? No? Thought not.

So – what, then?

Does this mean all that legislation is good and necessary? No. There are whole areas where, in my opinion, they go past “essential”, through “highly desirable,” through “this might be a good idea, but be realistic,” and all the way to “seriously? Come off it!” In addition, many areas of the NPPF have fuzzy and mutually inconsistent requirements, oscillating between “build, build, build!” to “Don’t build anything!”

Note the words “in my opinion,” in there. My opinion on what’s necessary and what’s not will differ from yours, and from the person next to you, and from other people. The solution is straightforward – but not simple: if we’re going to have process, have good process.

Have the right process and the quickest process

Easier said than done. There’s such a thing as Process Architecture, and Process Audits. Involved, argumentative, and they take time. They’re really boring, and can be expensive, so getting people to authorise them is a challenge. You have to go through every element, and interrelationship between elements. What’s essential, highly desirable, desirable, and what’s “who the hell put this in here and why?”

Don’t skip answering that final question! Chesterton’s Fence exists.

Then architect the sub-processes. If, say, reports are needed from stakeholders (sewage, flooding, highways, waste services, environmental, etc), be very clear what IS and what is NOT needed in them. Any report that’s not short and to the point is usually wasted (but not always – sometimes you need every little detail to stop the piss-takers and loophole-seekers). After this, open up all of the body of prior case law and re-visit all of the decisions based on your new process architecture (This makes the prior stuff easy, simple, and exciting by comparison).

Proposed short-cut

My personal shortcut through some of this? It’s not cheap, but it should work. There’s something called a “Local Development Order,” where planning permission can be (mostly) pre-issued for a site, as long as it’s for a specific purpose (housing, business, retail, scientific/technical, etc). Most of those needed reports are pre-done by the LA. This can, though, be expensive and LAs are already strapped.

In addition, needed infrastructure (schools, surgeries, roads, substation upgrades, sewerage upgrades) doesn’t come cheap and the standard method of funding it after the event, so that even if on time and on budget (spoiler: it never is), it can’t be available in time. If you have constant housing growth, then, for generations, infrastructure will be inadequate where housing is going up.

“Hey, guys, not only will you be living around building sites for decades, your kids won’t have enough schools, your families won’t have enough GPs, there will be constant gridlock, and don’t forget the literal rivers of shit when it rains too much.”

Good luck selling that. You want NIMBYs? There are always some NIMBYs, but this is how you augment their ranks a hundredfold. We live in a democracy – get people furious about something and you’ll have problems.

By our bootstraps

Give the LAs upfront funding to LDO all of the sites in their Local Plan – and to buy them at, say, triple the pre-uplift rate for land (so landowners get an incentive to sell, and the LA then gets most of the uplift in value from planning permission). Fund a one-off “getting ahead of the curve” push for the local infrastructure. Then, after the near-complete planning permission, they can sell off slots to developers (including smaller developers) or even self-build-support companies. The uplift in land values more than compensates for the original buying of the land AND the infrastructure, so you use that to fund the next tranche. And so on.

You’ve flipped the overloaded local infrastructure problem on its head. As long as development is going on, local infrastructure will be undersubscribed, as the houses take time to build and sell – and the next tranche of infrastructure comes on line for the next tranche of houses that are yet to be completed. Development locally means plenty of places in schools and hospitals and clear roads.

Whilst doing that, do that Process Architecture. It makes it easier, simpler, and cheaper for the LAs to do the LDOs and gives flexibility for other development. The vast majority of this process streamlining would be directly applicable to other infrastructure projects.

Or we could just complain about planning decisions (made according to compulsory legislation), fantasise about sweeping it all away (before rebuilding the same quagmire differently), and take refuge in shouting “It’s all NIMBYs!” And then wonder why we’re having the same discussion five more years down the road.

Andy Cooke

Andy Cooke is a District Councillor and substitute on a Planning Committee.