Conservatives preparing to Concrete over your County Cummings and Jenrick about to change planning laws to favour developers.

The change over from Theresa May to Boris Johnson as Leader of the Conservative Party has changed the way top Tories think about managing the UK. For years the Conservatives have sat back on matters that drive progress at a local level running campaign after campaign on their wish to control planning in their locale and conserve what they have. Its often been said that you can tell a good Tory by the amount of ‘brown furniture’ they have in their homes, and in many respects that true. But Boris Johnson thinks completely differently to most of his cohorts and on the advice of his man Dominic Cummings in forcing an election on the nation last December called it right and damaged his enemies beyond belief. That campaign was extremely costly in cash term to the Tory party but on installing Mr Johnson into No. 10 his Cummings his prime advisor came up with a plan to hook up the Tories in the long term with a sector who’s profits have grown and grown for the last seven decades, Construction! The construction industry has only one hurdle to cross to ensure it grows even faster in future,’Planning Laws’. They are a very simple process that attempts to ensure the long term aims of Councils and the wants of the Nation are fulfilled whist protecting people and the Countryside whenever possible. Hiccup’s in Planning Law can take years of wrangling to resolve and can be extremely costly to developers in both time and cash, cash that they can’t donate to the Tory Party because its locked up. Its been reported that Mr Cummings the PM’s notorious senior advisor, had identified a shake up of the planning system as the Tories biggest priority as soon as Mr Johnson assumed the throne as Prime Minister with a huge majority. He saw it as a major obstruction to growth in one the countries largest sectors, the housing market. The PM has also told Parliament that he is going to launch a series of infrastructure projects to kick start the economy after Covid 19 and Brexit and his experience of planning in a previous life as the Mayor of London coupled with his parties HS2 and Cross rail arguments have steered him towards acceptance of the Cummings plan. Cummings who is a very clever spin doctor has had Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick’s department work up new rules on the back of the Labour Party’s long term slogan when Councillors are arguing for more social housing, that of ‘People wish to live in towns and villages in which they were either born or brought up’. This is a major change from Conservative beliefs as it puts pressure on Parish Plans, Local Plans and Core Strategies but this is the direction that Policy Exchange the Tory right wing think tank wish to take Planning Law and the Conservative Government in the near future. To that end Ministers are waiting with baited breath to launch a White Paper that will delver change which will effect every City, Town and Village in England and change the way Utility Companies and Councils have to work in future. Leaked plans include the introduction of a zonal planning system and the use of ‘special planning zones which will allow developers to ’bypass’ the bureaucracy of the planning system and to start building almost as soon as they have done a deal on the land. Robert Jenrick when questioned said he ‘wants to rethink planning from its first principles’. Jenrick is pushing a massive and dramatic extension of permitted development rights where developers can see vacant buildings demolished then immediately replaced with housing without the need for planning permission. Developments will be fast tracked through the system if they meet high design standards, putting pressure on village and County Town settings to accept higher population numbers into their communities, something that will be hated by the ‘Brown Furniture’ property owners. Its to be followed on by more bubble thinking from the Tories through the creation of special planning zones that would see Government investment in infratructure to open up sites for private development and zonal planning systems will stop your local Council being involved in planning outcomes. Jenrick is expecting the Tories ‘New Wave’ MP’s whom are mostly urban based to carry this white paper through its various Parliamentary stages, then the new Tories can sit back and watch their coffers grow. https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/rethinking-the-planning-system-for-the-21st-century/

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/872091/Planning_for_the_Future.pdf