Reform Rejects Yet Another Local Plan – Pennycook Immediately Vetoes It

BBC

Plans earmarking land for more than 40,000 new homes have been thrown out after thousands of responses were received through a public consultation.

West Northamptonshire Council’s Local Plan,was discussed and rejected by its planning policy committee on Monday.

The Reform UK-led authority had proposed up to 47,300 new homes across the area by 2043.

Mark Arnull, leader of the council said there had been an overwhelming objection to a large number of allocations and added: “There’s no point in doing a consultation if you don’t take the feedback on board.”

The consultation which ran from 29 January to 27 March received 6,184 responses.

Arnull said one of the key things people objected to was the large allocation to rural villages.

One proposal was to build about 300 homes on part of Collingtree Park Golf Club, near Northampton.

Residents raised concerns about views and the effect on the golf course, which would have lost between three and five holes.

In Long Buckby, near Daventry, land close to the railway station had been earmarked for about 1,000 homes.

Residents were worried about additional traffic and the availability of GPs, schools and other facilities. Some described the village as “already struggling with traffic issues”.

There were also plans for nine warehouses and a country park at Furtho Pit in Old Stratford, between the A5 and A508.

The council now has to produce a new Local Plan based on the 2026 National Planning Policy Framework and the 2026 Town and Country Planning Regulations.

Producing the new plan, and having it evaluated by a government assessor, could take around three years.

NN Journal

 decision by West Northamptonshire Reform UK administration to scrap its almost final local plan and begin again has been vetoed by the Labour government.

Housing secretary Matthew Pennycook has written to West Northamptonshire’s leader Cllr Mark Arnull today (September 15) using his statutory powers of intervention to say the decision made by the authority’s planning policy committee last night cannot go ahead.

Just three Reform UK councillors sitting on the committee made the decision, which would have seen five years of planning and consultation effectively thrown out the window and a new plan begun, despite planning officers saying it was expected the plan would pass.

The reason given by the administration was that it wanted to move ahead under the new 2026 National Planning Framework and also the uncertainty around devolution is causing uncertainty. The decision to scrap it was very late in the day. North Northamptonshire Council decided back in January to re-do its local plan.

In a news release published in the last hour, WNC said:

“The letter instructs the Council to continue with the process for the current draft Plan by:

• Starting Regulation 19 consultation on the emerging plan by no later than 5 October 2026 for a minimum 6-week period;
• Submitting the emerging plan by no later than 31 December 2026;
• Not to take any step to withdraw the Plan and report monthly to Government officials on the progress of the Plan
• Progress the Plan up to the end of the examination process.

The Government has given WNC until 29 September to set out any exceptional circumstances which suggest intervention is not appropriate.”

WNC leader Mark Arnull, said:

“We are deeply disappointed that the Government has chosen to intervene in our decision to start afresh on our Local Plan.

“We made our decision in the best interests of our residents to ensure we had the time needed to prepare the right Plan that addresses their concerns, reflects the new National Planning Policy Framework, and adequately shape the future growth of our communities.

“We firmly believe our communities deserve a Local Plan that is truly deliverable, reflects local priorities and commands public confidence, not one that has been simply pushed through by the Government to meet their deadlines and expectations.

“Our residents should not be forced to choose between having a Plan quickly and having a Plan that works. Despite our disappointment we will now carefully consider the Government’s direction and its implications, while continuing to make the case for a Local Plan that delivers sustainable growth in the right places and at the right pace for West Northamptonshire.”

A new plan would have cost the authority £700,000.

Leader of the Labour Group Cllr Sally Keeble has welcomed the government intervention.
She said:

“I welcome it [government intervention]. The decision that was taken by the council was with very little thought.”

The cabinet is due to meet at 6pm tonight.

Enfield Inspector Approves Two New Town Green Belt Sites but deletes other smaller Green Belt Releases

Enfield Dispatch

A government-appointed planning inspector has told Enfield Council to cancel its plans for 160 new homes on the Green Belt at Hadley Wood – and also restrict a number of other proposed development sites.

Inspector Steven Lee today (Monday 15^th) issued his long-awaited verdict on the council’s Enfield Local Plan, which had included the proposed de-designation of several Metropolitan Green Belt sites in the borough, to allow developers to build on them.

After 29 days of public examination hearings over the past 18 months – which heard considerable evidence over whether or not the Local Plan should be deemed legally ‘sound’ – the inspector has concluded that the document needs a series of major modifications in order to comply with the law.

As well as completely removing the allocation of 160 homes on Green Belt land to the west of Hadley Wood Station, Lee has also recommended that most of Crews Hill Golf Course be kept within the Green Belt and said the council “should consider” cancelling the allocation of 200 homes for the golf course – which is a site of importance for nature conservation (Sinc).

In addition, the inspector has instructed the council to lower its height limits for any new development at Palace Gardens Shopping Centre and to remove the allocation of a new industrial site on land to the east of junction 24 of the M25, which is also currently Green Belt.

Regarding Hadley Wood, Lee wrote in his letter to the council that its assessment of the likely harm caused by building 160 homes on three fields between Camlet Way and Crescent Way was in his view an “underestimate” and that “even with mitigations in place” the proposed development “would have a significant detrimental effect on the existing character of this area”.

The three fields – currently used for grazing animals – are owned by the Duchy of Lancaster. During a public examination session last June looking at the council’s plans for the area, a representative of the regal landowner said that it was intending to submit a planning application as soon as 2026.

But in his letter, Lee concluded: “I do not consider the exceptional circumstances needed to demonstrate removal of this site from the Green Belt have been demonstrated. Accordingly, the council should draft modifications deleting the site from the plan, reintegrating the land into the Green Belt and making consequential changes to the other relevant policies.”

In making this recommendation, the inspector also referenced the “very significant effects” on the Green Belt of the council’s housing allocations at Crews Hill (5,500 homes) and ‘Chase Park’ (3,700 homes).

However, because these sites are much larger, they “will allow a far greater degree of mitigation or enhancement to be provided that could help to minimise those impacts”.

For this reason, Lee has not recommended the removal of these two Green Belt housing sites from the Local Plan – only going as far as the suggestion of protecting Crews Hill Golf Course, because of its biological value.

Crews Hill Golf Course

Regarding the golf course, Lee wrote: “The creation of a new defensible boundary by the development itself would be preferable to rolling back the Green Belt boundary excessively and risking even greater encroachment than currently anticipated.”

The inspector added that an alternative “acceptable” approach would be to use Cattlegate Road as the new Green Belt boundary to the west of Crews Hill Station, thereby safeguarding the entire golf course from development.

“I do not consider the reduction in delivery of 200 dwellings would undermine the justification for the overall placemaking area,” Lee said.

Proposed development of another nature conservation site in Crews Hill, called Glasgow Stud, should also be limited, the inspector argued. He wrote: “The council should therefore draft modifications which limit Green Belt release in or around the Glasgow Stud SINC to those areas where development is intended or where it would otherwise leave an area of Green Belt to be disconnected or isolated from the remainder.”

Lee also made some recommendations for the proposed ‘Chase Park’ development, on land at Vicarage Farm and surrounding areas in World’s End. However, unlike at Crews Hill, he has not suggested a reduction in its size.

Instead, the inspector focused on the proposed extension to Trent Park, which developer Comer Homes admitted during the public examination that it wished to ditch.

Lee wrote in his letter: “Given the extension of the country park is a key part of the mitigation for this allocation, then it is important that it is delivered as envisaged. Therefore, to be effective the policy should include a mechanism that ensures the country park extension is delivered in a timely manner alongside the delivery of any housing.”

During the public examination process, the government proposed that both Crews Hill and Chase Park become a so-called ‘new town’ with 21,000 homes, more than doubling what the council was putting forward in the Local Plan.

This even larger housing scheme – potentially shrinking Enfield’s Green Belt by 30% – led to growing local anger and opposition which then became a central theme of this year’s local election, where the Conservative and Green parties together won eleven council seats from Labour after both pledging to “protect the Green Belt”.

These gains were enough to oust the Labour administration, with new Tory council leader Alessandro Georgiou subsequently announcing the council’s formal withdrawal from the government’s new towns programme – a move which this month prompted Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to denounce Enfield Council as “naysayers” and “blockers”.

Although it now seems likely that City Hall will establish a mayoral development corporation to deliver the new town instead, as a way of working around the council’s objections, the civic centre maintains control over what happens next to its own Local Plan.

Reacting to Lee’s letter today, deputy council leader Mike Rye said: “Enfield’s new administration was elected on a clear mandate to protect the borough’s heritage, character, and green spaces.

“We have inherited the draft Local Plan from the previous administration, having consistently expressed our concerns about its potential impact on Enfield.

“The planning inspector’s findings reflect some of those concerns, and we welcome the recommendation to remove certain development sites from the Green Belt.

“We will now review the findings in full before determining the right next steps for our borough.”

My Entry for the Beautiful Data Centres Contest

AJ Government to launch data centre design contest

The Data Centre Design Challenge, the first government-backed competition of its kind, will be led by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, and will be open to architects, designers and engineers.

Entrants will be asked to work with communities ‘to raise the bar on high-quality design, meaningful public engagement and sustainable environmental outcomes’.

With the demand for data centres set to grow significantly in the coming years, the government believes this rapid increase in the number of facilities, their individual size, and environmental demands will create ‘both a major national infrastructure challenge and a significant design opportunity’.

Pennycook blocks Torbay Local Plan Submission for only meeting 45% of Housing Need

Intervention Letter

In November, the Council published a draft local plan for Regulation 18 consultation with a housing requirement that met just 42% of the area’s Local Housing Need (LHN), leaving a shortfall of 10,980 homes over the plan period. There appears to be limited up-to-date evidence available to justify the Council’s approach. I am particularly concerned that, despite recent work to re-align your emerging plan with the 2024 version of the National Planning Policy Framework, an up-to-date Housing and Economic Land Availability Assessment (HELAA) has not yet been published. I am also aware that the Council has failed to respond to enquiries from my officials about when this document may be released. Without updated evidence on land availability, it is not possible to reach a conclusion on whether the Council has taken a sufficiently robust approach to the identification of suitable sites for development and, therefore, whether the plan stands a reasonable chance of being found sound at examination.

The Secretary of State has broad default powers of intervention under section 27 of the 2004 Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act which can be exercised where he thinks that a local planning authority are failing or omitting to do anything it is necessary for them to do in connection with the preparation, revision or adoption of a development plan document. I consider that the Council’s proposal of a housing requirement which falls well below LHN in its draft plan, combined with the aforementioned lack of published evidence to support this approach, meets the legal threshold for intervention. I have also considered the criteria laid out in the Planning Practice Guidance (PPG), which states that intervention under section 27 of the 2004 Act “should have regard to plan progress and local development needs”:

• Plan Progress: Torbay’s current local plan was adopted in 2015, meaning the policies it contains are likely to be out of date, and there is a pressing need for the Council to adopt an up-to-date local plan to reduce the area’s vulnerability to piecemeal and speculative development. Progressing a plan which may be unsatisfactory risks failure at examination, and further delays whilst the Council begins work on a new local plan in the new plan-making system provided for in the Levelling Up and Regeneration Act 2023.

• Development needs: The Council’s latest (2023) Housing Delivery Test score was 66%, putting the area into the presumption in favour of sustainable development. There is also an acknowledged shortage of affordable homes in Torbay, which is unlikely to be addressed in the absence of an up-to-date plan.

Additionally, the draft plan published for Regulation 18 consultation by the Council does not meet local needs given the low housing requirement it contains. Taking all of the above into account, I consider that the intervention criteria are met, and that intervention is justified. Therefore, I am directing the Council under section 27(2)(b) of the 2004 Act to submit to me all available evidence base documents which inform your conclusion that only 42% of local housing need can be met through your emerging plan. This should include an updated HELAA (including consideration of sites proposed in the most recent Call for Sites in 2025), along with any relevant studies the Council has commissioned on matters such as constraints, residential densities, impacts on National Landscape or other landscape impacts, and any housing-related topic papers that the Council has produced to date. This information should be provided within three weeks of the date of this letter. Following consideration of the evidence, I will determine whether the further use of the Secretary of State’s powers under section 21 and/or section 27 of the 2004 Act is required to make the plan satisfactory. Notwithstanding this direction, I would like to give you an opportunity to set out by 24 June 2026 any exceptional circumstances which in your view suggest that intervention is not appropriate in this case. To be clear, this neither alters nor removes the direction set out in this letter. Whilst I hope that the Council will continue to engage constructively with my department, I must be clear at this stage that I will not hesitate to take further action if this request is not complied with.

(note Torbay is tightly bound and this shortfall will only be solved via the Devon (or Devon and Cornwall whatever it is SDS).

Reform Leadr of Calderdale Threatens to Take Allocated Former Green Belt Sites out of Local Plan

Yorkshire Live

Sections of Calderdale’s housing strategy for development through the coming decade may be reversed, the council’s leader has suggested.

Calderdale Council Leader, Councillor Dan Sutherland, indicates that the figures have shifted and his administration intends to modify the authority’s Local Plan, which designates land where new residential and commercial developments could be constructed into the 2030s.

Cllr Sutherland’s Reform UK group assumed control of the council following May’s elections.

Regarding housing, and accounting for sites where homes had already received approval but remained unbuilt, the Local Plan identified space for nearly 10,000 new properties – a requirement imposed by Government on every local authority.

The plan received approval in spring 2023 after an extensive inquiry process which ultimately resulted in Planning Inspector Katie Child approving the plan.

However, it has proved highly contentious in certain areas of Calderdale where sites including some on green belt land were designated for new housing, particularly around Brighouse, Rastrick, Hipperholme, Greetland, Northowram and Shelf.

Thousands of new properties are incorporated within garden village proposals for two locations near Brighouse at Thornhill and Woodhouse.

Planning applications have begun to emerge for certain sites, but Cllr Sutherland – who as a Labour Cabinet member participated in developing the Local Plan – maintains that the figures have altered.

The Local Plan is scheduled to commence a five-year review next year. Cllr Sutherland (Illingworth and Mixenden) stated his party had committed during the local election to safeguard green space from excessive development.

In a video message shared on the council’s social media platforms, Cllr Sutherland said: “As you know many green belt sites are proposed for the development of new housing and other constructions. But more recent evidence has shown that the population of Calderdale is not growing.

“We will be looking at how we can review those sites, where possible remove some of those sites, from the Local Plan and focus on building housing that is actually appropriate for the needs of local people.”

Cllr Sutherland said that Calderdale has an ageing population and what would be required were developments suitable for that demographic.

“Extra care sites, bungalows, these developments will free up family homes for those who need them – it’s about the right type of housing in the right places,” he stated.

This approach would differ from the previous Labour administration’s housing strategy – members had contended Calderdale must plan for sufficient new homes to support population expansion and economic activity, rather than simply “stand still.”

The former Cabinet members had maintained it was crucial to provide homes that younger adults and families could relocate to, preventing them from being forced to leave the borough or being priced out due to limited availability.

Did Oxford make an Elementary Error in Not putting its Local Plan to Full Council?

Local Government Lawyer

A High Court judge has ordered Oxford City Council not to submit the draft Oxford Local Plan 2045 to the Secretary of State Housing, Communities and Local Government for examination prior to the final determination of a judicial review claim or further order of the court.

Dr Ashley Bowes of Landmark Chambers, who acts for campaign group Friends of the Fields, Iffley, said on LinkedIn that the case concerned Regulation 8 of the Strategic Environmental Association Regulations 2004, which requires the Full Council (“i.e. not just officers or a sub-committee of members or a cabinet member”) to take account of the responses to the Reg. 18 and Reg. 19 consultations.

He said that duty “bites both on submission and on adoption (see Flaxby Park [2020] EWHC 3204 (Admin). Resolving to submit the Plan before the Reg.19 consultation has even been conducted is therefore a straightforward breach of Reg.8.”

I thought it was well known that under Local Authorities (Functions and Responsibilities) (England) Regulations 2000 decisions on local plans were reserved to full council. Reg 8 of the SEA regs simply states that you cant submit until the SEA consultation is concluded in line with the regs.

Im wondering of the SEA issue is a red herring. The key issue is whether or not the submission was lawful? If it was an executive or officer decision it seemingly is not recorded in theforward plan or council register of decisions?

Can Enfield Block a New Town?

Guardian

Enfield council in north London has withdrawn from the government’s new towns programme, in a significant blow to Labour’s flagship housebuilding scheme.

The move by the new minority Conservative-led administration could present one of the first tests of Rachel Reeves’s planning changes, designed to curb the use of judicial reviews against new infrastructure.

The project to build 21,000 homes at Crews Hill and Chase Park on the northern fringes of the capital was selected in March for the new towns programme along with six other locations across England.

[ new leader] Georgiou said: “We have been elected on a clear mandate to protect Enfield’s green belt, and today we are honouring that commitment by formally withdrawing from the new town process.

Enfields main mods and examination hearings have now concluded.

Enfield could vote to withdraw its local plan but the SOS could use powers to block this – as at Oldham and South Tyneside

However following the Court of Appeals decision at Wrexham the Council could simply vote not to adopt. The inspectors report is ‘binding’ in that they cannot adopt other than in accordance with the main mods. However the landmark Court of Appeal ruling established that it does not force local councillors to adopt the plan itself.

The SOS could then intervene to adopt but has never been done before, such as at Castlepoint, and the dithering at Wrexham made them wary of JR. I have little doubt this will be undertaken here.

Though to be safe from JR the SOS will probably wait until the New Town programme consultation on SEA is completed (though noting this is for a far larger scheme than considered in the local plan and with no plans of how its traffic impact will be mitigated).

Enfield has also withdrawn suppoort for a Tottenham Women’s training scheme at Whitewebbs, though they have previously voted to consent this and it mainly is an appropriate Green Belt use. They legally wont be able to refuse to sign the S106 is the local plan is adopted.

to avoid this nonsense we need to revert to the 2004 act position of inspectors making main mods and adopting plans. It always was a farce to give the false illusion of choice for cllrs.

Grey Belt Site in Middle of Nowhere

Interesting recovered appeal in Thurrock

Grey Belt but not adjoining a village, refused for not meeting golden rule on sustainable transport

An hourly service insufficient.

Subsidy for hourly service not viable in long term and scale not related in scale or kind so does not meet CIL regs.

Certainly the Grey Belt definition could be tightened to remove such ‘leapfrog sites’ and the reference to cumulative impact in thedraft revised NPPF helps a little,

But it does mean that LPAs should not think that 80% of their Green Belt is vulnerable – such as Leeds recently with the A1m.

No need to Zone for Any Hyperscale Datacentres in UK

Imagine the government set a target of building 26 million houses by 2030. Crazy right, Unachievable right?

Well for datacentres that is precisely the government plan. IT Pro,

“There are upwards of 50 gigawatts (GW) of data centers wanting to connect to the grid by 2030,” says Dan Roberts, executive director at Frontier Economics’ energy practice. By contrast, Oxford Economics estimates that the UK had around 2.9 GW of data centers in 2025.

“There is no way these will all be built,” says Roberts. He explains that many of these are speculative projects by developers, with some just an option on a piece of land with no planning permission and not even a memo of understanding with potential users.

What is more less than half this potential capacity is financed. And finance is falling away as developers realise that without grid connection, gpus or even the speiclaised electrical parts or electrical engineers to build them development is pushed back years, hencc major deals such as Stargates deal to build a data centres in tyneside, or microsofts deal with open ai are falling apart,

Data centre are consuming so much power that they even raise ambient temperatures near by.

Bloomberg in the states have found that areas around data centres have wholesale prices 267% higher than 5 years ago.

The whole industry of hyperscalers investing in ai companies who are tied to spending on hyperscalers is a circular bubble bound to pop. Watch Open AIs IPO they are unlikley to raise the 850 billion needed, foreign sovereign wealth forms are banned. I suspect the ipo will be delayed and this will burst the entire bubble.

In previous bubble, such as several London office market bubbles, it was clear the pipeline could never be filled.

No wonder places are turning against data centres. In the US cllrs voting for them are being voted out of office. In edinburgh cllrs recently voted on a report on the case for a moratorium

Yet where is the government research showing the scale of the pipeline, howe much of this can pshyically ever be built and how much we really need to zone for?

The Scottish Government provides no definition of what constitutes a green data centre, saying only ‘To be considered a green data centre, planning authorities may wish to consider criteria such as the extent to which the data centre is powered from renewable energy sources; makes use of energy efficient technologies; seeks to minimise water consumption; and supports the re-use of excess heat.’ 1.3 In January, the Planning Committee requested that the Planning Convener write to the Scottish Government seeking a definition of a green data centre, to inform future planning application determinations.

Firstly the government needs to understand the scale of the problem, secondly it needs to define a green data centre. Thirdly comparative advantage states that it is economically crazy to plan for hyperscalers in a country with the highest industrial energy costs in the world. Rather than model training the focus should be on transacational processing, inference and supercomputing research only. The Ai training is best in places like Iceland with lower energy, colling and water costs.

The Tragic Loss of the London Dual Aspect Rule @SteveReedMP

Under pressure from the government the Mayor of London has dropped the ‘Maximise dual aspect dwelling’ rule from the London Design guide

The rule was introduced to reduce overheating.

However since the single staircase rule was dropped it has become almost impossible to implement as this effectivelymandates double stacked corridors.

The rule whilst it existed almost created a new London Vernacular.

You saw an end to coffin like facades reminiscent of 70s office blocks

You also saw a revival of short access logias

Andrew Berherral

Successive London Plans from Mayors of London have promoted and now mandated “dual aspect” homes – dwellings with openable windows on two or more walls – and tightened the definition to require outlook on opposing sides. The Greater London Authority’s latest housing design standards guidance, published in June 2023, says: “Covered outside decks are a healthier, safer and more convivial solution, and allow dwellings to be dual aspect.”

Previously, national government’s building regulations part O (overheating) has introduced UK-wide pressure to provide cross-ventilation. In addition, universal lift access and impending two-staircase rules threaten with extinction the “mansion block” arrangement of clustering a small number of flats around a compact stair core.

On this context, the many practical advantages of deck access are increasingly apparent. It offers a better response to climate change than other housing typologies because it tends to provide a simple easy-to-insulate envelope, cross-ventilation, daylight and sunlight from two directions and shading to counter overheating.

However the over struct second satircase rule has now made traditional external access (like LCC housing) and mansion blocks around a tight staircase core impossible, and the drafting of part O needed reconsideration to be compabile. Now we have a combination of bed regulations that prohibit good design. Bwloe are expamples of good schemes now impossible

Also the rule made designing thre4e bedroom apartments much easier, you can wrap multiple sizes of apartments around a tight central stair core.

South Korea has the same rate of fire deaths per 1000 population as the UK and it allows single staircases to 20 storeys. There is no correlation between single staircases and fire deaths, indeed in the US after mandating double staorcases fire death have increased by 44%, the correlation is inverse.

Why are we mandating the typology on the left?

The abolition misses the point, the real hit to affordability, and reason for completion collapse in London, is the dual staircase rule.

We should be outraged, design and amenity bodies should create a united campaign. This is a classic example of how small changes to individual regulations prohibitt good design and traditional typologies. Britosh Columbia has just made this reform.