Harborough council leader says he has 'many concerns' over Government's radical shake-up of planning rules

The worried leader of Harborough council is to tell the Government that he has “many concerns” about its bombshell blueprint to shake up planning.

Cllr Phil King said he backs “certain elements” of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s radical new ‘Planning for the Future’ initiative.

But the Conservative council boss insisted that the authority will fight its corner amid fears they will be ordered to build many more houses across Harborough.

He spoke out as Cllr Phil Knowles, who heads up the council’s Liberal Democrat group, said the controversial shock proposals should be fought full stop.

Cllr King told the Harborough Mail: “We do have many concerns about the Government’s new White Paper.

“We will be considering and firming up our response at a meeting of our Cabinet on Monday October 5.

“We will then be giving our feedback to the Government before the deadline of Thursday October 29 comes up.”

He stressed: “We do support bits of the plan such as speeding up delivery of the planning process.

“But we are working non stop in Harborough to more than meet growing demand for new homes.

“New figures show that in the financial year of 2019-2020 we built an amazing 905 properties across the district.

“And that marks a record high for us.

“That’s a phenomenal number because our annual requirement is 557.

“We are striving to supply more affordable homes here as well as properties in the right areas, close to where people work.”

Cllr King said Harborough council “is well on top of the situation here”.

“We have got thousands more homes here now than we had 20 years ago.

“But the Government would want us to build 25,000 homes over the next 20 years.

“That would double the number set out in our Local Plan,” he argued.

“To build that many properties we’d have to create a whole new town, maybe two new towns.

“We are strongly opposed to this.

“And we are making our views known to our local MPs and Ministers.”

Cllr King said council officers have put forward “nine key areas of interest” as part of their response to the Government:

• The council supports simplifying the preparation and operation of Local Plans

• It raises concerns about the automatic granting of outline planning approval in Growth areas designated through the local plan without the need for a separate planning application

• It expresses concerns at the introduction of a nationally set housing requirement for the district which “is not necessary”. The well-established partnership working across Leicester and Leicestershire Housing Market Area should continue

It does not support the proposal to automatically return a planning application fee if a planning application should take longer to determine than the statutory eight-week period. The existing system of securing extensions of time from applicants is felt to work well and positively enables development to come forward through supporting negotiation and establishing common ground

It supports the new emphasis the Paper proposed to place on more visual, map-based, local plans. But it says careful consideration needs to be given relating to equalities considerations, especially for those in the community who do not have easy access to the internet

It supports the retention of neighbourhood plans

It backs the development of design coding and guides. However, this is likely to require extra specialist expert and additional financial resources in tough financial times

It raises concerns about a nationally set flat rate for the provision of infrastructure through the nationally set and locally collected Infrastructure Levy. This does not allow for wide variations in land values nationally

It sets out that it is considered equalities, implications and impacts need careful consideration, especially in relation to online accessibility to the community and affordable housing provision.

Cllr Knowles said the council’s ruling Conservative group should have backed the Liberal Democrat motion 'Protecting the public's say in the planning process' at a full council meeting.

He said the council would be forced to build a staggering 1,238 homes every year if the radical White Paper becomes law.

“This bombshell scheme has the power to turn our country’s whole planning process upside down.

“We all know that the current system could possibly be tweaked here and there to improve it,” said Cllr Knowles.

“But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater.

“This new White Paper could produce the slums of tomorrow – that can’t be right.

“Even Conservative councillors here are telling me this is giving them sleepless nights.

“We should have had the chance to discuss this properly at the council meeting rather than it being slipped straight through to the Cabinet.

“The Government’s ‘masterplan’ will wield a massive impact on tens of thousands of people moving into new homes in the future as well as people who live here already.

“It will drive a double-decker bus through our current planning laws and regulations – and it’s got to be stopped.”