Rachel Reeves is set to announce a series of planning changes before the budget aimed at boosting Britain's sluggish economic growth. The chancellor hopes the measures will make it easier for developers to build houses and infrastructure projects, potentially filling about £3bn of the estimated £30bn black hole in public finances.
The package is designed to bolster fragile private sector confidence, which fell to a record low last month according to the Institute of Directors. However, ministers are at odds over how radical the changes should be, with some arguing that the latest attempts amount only to technical adjustments of existing plans.
A government source said: 'The Treasury is desperate to make announcements on planning, but the truth is we are already doing most of the stuff we wanted to, and trying to reopen all of that is not a good idea.' Meanwhile, planning lawyer Alexa Culver described the situation as a 'chaotic slew of destructive new bills, with no strategy, vision, due process, consultation or democratic mandate'.
Reeves and Keir Starmer have put planning reform at the heart of their growth plans, launching a bill earlier this year to reduce costs for wildlife protection. However, the bill was watered down after a backlash from developers and pressure from Labour MPs. Reeves is now looking to strengthen it again in the Lords, considering proposals to ease building for projects with minimal environmental impact and to allow adaptation of approved plans.
Other potential changes include restricting judicial reviews against infrastructure projects and banning judges from quashing planning approvals while legal cases are ongoing. If the bill passes before the budget, officials believe the Office for Budget Responsibility could judge it to add about £3bn a year to the economy in the long term.
However, some in government warn that pushing for significant changes risks reopening a bruising political fight. One senior official said: 'The risk is by doing this she makes the bill even harder to pass and that will have the opposite effect to what is intended.' The environment secretary, Emma Reynolds, is also drawing up a separate nature bill that officials say would help speed up the planning system.
