2022 to date has seen much uncertainty for the planning and development world – not, as had long been anticipated, because of a raft of new guidance and policies, but because of the absence of such.

While many were still working their way through the 322 pages of the Levelling Up White Paper in search of concrete policies that would bring about some overdue changes, specifically in relation to housing targets and the provision of affordable housing, we were hit by the rumour that the proposed Planning Bill has been abandoned. And shortly after that came a hint by the new housing minister that the housing targets under the ‘standard methodology’ are to be changed from being mandatory minima to advisory maxima.

For a sector that believed, back in August 2020, that the Planning for the Future White Paper would bring about radical reform, this back-tracking on several levels has created uncertainty.

The likelihood that the Government is proposing to scrap the Planning Bill, which was announced in last year’s Queen's Speech - finally condemning the controversial White Paper to the dustbin - has been on the cards for some time. In one of his first moves as Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities in September last year, Michael Gove paused progress of the policy to conduct a review. The following month the Conservative party chairman Oliver Dowden said that the Government was ‘looking again’ at the proposals within the White Paper, specifically the planned broad-brush approach to simplify strategic planning by ‘zoning’ land for Growth, Renewal or Protection.

This specific policy had already resulted in controversy, not least in the Chesham and Amersham by-election in June last year, when the Conservative party lost a 16,000 majority primarily due to planning controversy. It was acknowledged then that voters were concerned over the perceived reduced public consultation that would come about as a result of zoning. Politicians stated that voters had been heard ‘loud and clear’ and that the by-election result represented a ‘warning shot’.