Following the mini budget, Tracy Lovejoy and Melody Li of Irwin Mitchell Solicitors examine the key proposals in the government’s Growth Plan
The mini budget and Growth Plan announced on 23 September outlined important proposals for the planning and building industries, including the roll-out of new Investment Zones, reforms for the consenting process for major infrastructure projects and scaling back of environmental and planning controls within these proposals.
Investment Zones will be deregulated, low-tax areas designed to stimulate growth by building development. They will contain low-tax sites and deregulated development sites and some will be a combination of both. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has stated that it will soon set out the detail on planning deregulation, and from discussions and press releases, this is likely to involve general deregulation for planning development, streamlining of applications already in place and promises to remove “EU red tape”, many of which are centred around environmental regulations.
Along with environmental controls, there are a number of assurances which the current planning system provides, including ensuring that local infrastructure, like highways, is in place to absorb the impact of new development, ensuring that due consideration is given to the impact of new development on existing residents, like noise, smell, air quality and smoke, as well as ensuring local democracy and of course maintaining necessary green space and biodiversity. The detail of these deregulation zones will show how and if the government intends to maintain these protections.
The government is already in talks with 38 authorities about setting up Investment Zones and officially invited applications or “expressions of interest” from other mayoral or upper tier authorities (like county councils) on 2 October 2022.
In respect of local democracy, it is interesting that upper tier councils, instead of lower tier districts or boroughs, will decide whether or not to put forward expressions of interest. This is one step removed from local councils, the most direct administrator of local areas, deciding for themselves whether to deregulate their areas.
However, there will still be an element of democracy as firstly, upper tier councils require “local consent” to put themselves forward. We have not seen a definition of local consent but it may involve local councillors voting in public meetings to decide whether to give this consent to their county councils.
County councillors, many of whom are also local councillors, are also likely to have to vote before putting in an expression of interest.
Development consent orders (DCO)
The Growth Plan also announced reforms to the process of approving infrastructure projects – the development consent order (DCO) process whereby all the consents, which can include planning permissions, road and rights of way diversions and compulsory acquisitions of land for major infrastructure projects are determined through the same process.
DCOs were introduced as a streamlining procedure but perhaps inevitably, because of the issues and interests involved, the process can be significant. The Growth Plan complains that, for instance, offshore windfarms can take four years to obtain consent.
The Growth Plan announced the Planning & Infrastructure Bill. A draft of the bill is not available but the plan states that its aims include reducing the burden of environmental assessments and bureaucracy in the consultation process, reforming current protections for protected species and their habitats and making it easier to change DCOs after confirmation. Other reforms include reducing the options and opportunity to judicially review DCOs after they are confirmed.
We must confess to feeling nervous about any kind of shift from general streamlining of EU environmental laws to some sort of trade-off between economic growth and environmental protection and also curbing the already limited rights to challenge and scrutinise legislation and policy by judicial review.
However, the Growth Plan should be viewed in the wider context, which includes our ongoing international commitments regarding climate change, like our pledge to be net zero by 2050, as well as the requirement to assess the environmental impact, as part of a wider assessment, of new legislation and policy.
Finally, a word on resourcing: Investment Zones will be characterised by tax and rate exemptions, deregulation and subsidies designed to attract investment, stimulate growth by development and encourage businesses to build. They will encourage business growth by a wide array of tax cuts and allowances, ranging from stamp duty to business rates to green levies. The government will subsidise these cuts and also provide funding or settlement for these zones. A relevant question is where this money will come from and what impact it will have on the wider planning system, which because of successive cuts to local government struggles to resource its planning duties properly. We would have liked to see the Growth Plan address this issue also.
Tracy Lovejoy
Senior Associate
Planning & Environment Department
Melody Li
Trainee solicitor
Irwin Mitchell Solicitors
Tel: +44 (0)121 212 1828
