On 20 July, the Government published an updated version of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), following consultation earlier this year. First introduced in 2012, this revision comprises the fourth iteration of the NPPF – the non-spatial planning framework for England and a material consideration in planning applications.

In a letter to the Planning Inspectorate, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government Robert Jenrick set out the intention for the revised document to ‘support councils in delivering beautiful places to live and work and to ensure that communities have greater influence over development location and design.'

Building beautiful

The revised NPPF reiterates the Government’s desire for building beautiful and for achieving sustainable development, with the introduction of ‘beauty’ as a development requirement in a first for national planning policy. Beauty is now included in the definition of sustainable development and features throughout the framework in relation to development design and planning policy requirements.

What constitutes ‘beauty’ is not defined in the NPPF, which introduces a high degree of subjectivity to the planning process. While requiring good design as part of a robust planning process is to be commended, the absence of a definition for the key output – that is, something that is beautiful – creates ambiguity, which is unhelpful when the perceived lack of ‘beauty’ can be a sole reason to refuse an application.

Design codes

To support the delivery of beautiful development, local authorities are now required to create design codes or codes consistent with the National Design Guide.

Design codes can play a key role in ensuring full consideration is given to the design of new development, thus delivering improved outcomes. However, these need to be produced in a timely fashion to avoid undue delay in the delivery of new development.

Given constrained local authority resource, and the complex nature of effective design codes which are truly reflective of an area, without a combined public/private approach there’s a risk that new development will be held up by the production of these documents.

The environment

Paragraph 131 of the NPPF emphasises the importance of trees to the character of an area and the quality of environments. The requirement for new streets to be tree-lined will have significant highways implications and it is unlikely the solutions suggested in this paragraph will work in all circumstances. The buy-in of highways authorities on adoption will therefore be important, as will the anticipated locally led revisions to Manual for Streets.

The other key aspect of the revisions is the definition of sustainable development; notably paragraph 7, which now reflects the 17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development from the UN, and paragraph 8, where the wording has been strengthened with a requirement to ‘protect and enhance’ the environment and ‘improve biodiversity’ rather than ‘contribute to’ protection and ‘helping to improve’ biodiversity. This is welcomed, and reflective of national goals to meet the climate change challenges and deliver biodiversity net gain.

Missed opportunities

Given the need for a comprehensive range of policy measures to address climate change, there is a notable absence of clear guidance in the NPPF. For example, there is no reference to the Energy Hierarchy, which usefully sets out the priorities in order – that is, reduce demand, use energy efficiently and consider use of renewables.

Paragraph 155 focuses only on the use and supply of renewable energy/low carbon energy and paragraph 157 outlines the expectations for new development with a focus on decentralised energy supply with only a brief reference at the end of this paragraph to ‘minimise energy consumption’. Within these changes there is no requirement for local authorities to plan positively to increase the supply of renewable energy, which is a missed opportunity.

The restriction at paragraph 158 b) footnote 54 affecting onshore wind turbines is retained and is inconsistent with the general thrust of policy, which is in favour of low carbon energy-generating technology. Since its introduction in 2015, this element of the NPPF has effectively blocked the delivery of new sites for onshore wind, even in those locations where a resource can economically be derived without impacting on sensitive landscapes.

The need to de-carbonise the grid requires that such sources of available low-carbon energy should be available for commercial realisation and in this context the footnote needs to be deleted or substantially amended. The fact that the Government has not done so is a missed opportunity, especially in the run-up to COP26.    

The wording of Green Belt policy also remains unchanged from previous versions (and has in fact remained similar for 40 years now – referring back to the former PPG2). The revised NPPF provided the opportunity to define certain renewable energy technologies that might not be ‘inappropriate development’ in the Green Belt. Such a change would have encouraged the appropriate siting of energy infrastructure in proximity to major towns and cities, where the greatest need for renewables arises. 

Increasing the supply of renewable energy is essential to protect the natural environment and it is another missed opportunity that it is not recognised in respect of the sustainable development objectives at paragraph 8. We can only hope that these shortcomings are addressed in the forthcoming Planning Bill so that the targets identified by the Committee on Climate Change can be achieved, particularly in light of the number of local authorities who have declared a climate emergency as set out in recent Savills research.

Plan making

In relation to plan making, the presumption in favour of sustainable development has been retained. Importantly, the definition has been updated in Paragraph 11a, providing a greater focus on the twin requirements for development to improve the environment and mitigate climate change. The requirement for plans to ‘positively’ seek to meet development needs has been removed from this paragraph (although it remains in paragraph 16 and is a key test of ‘soundness’ at paragraph 35). The focus remains on ‘meeting’ development needs – perhaps the very minimum requirement.

Reference to local plans being sufficiently flexible to respond effectively to rapid change has also been dropped from paragraph 11. This previously aided the production of local plans that remain effective throughout their duration and factored in a necessary degree of plan contingency and robustness.

Paragraph 22 expands the need for local plans to look further ahead than the minimum plan period – indeed at least 30 years – to take into account the timescale for delivery of major strategic sites or new settlements.

Robert Jenrick’s letter to PINS confirms the amendments to paragraph 22 have generated concern amongst some local authorities regarding the implications for their emerging plans and updated guidance is to be issued. This also raises some further practical implications, for example on the housing trajectory and five, 10 and 15-year housing land supply. In addition, this additional requirement will put further stress on the limited resources of authorities to plan that far ahead.

Permitted development

The updated text on the removal or alterations to statues and monuments increases protection to these assets. This will likely result in increased complexity to the planning process in relation to permitted development rights and other, non-planning requirements.

Guidance on the use of Article 4 Directions has been updated to reflect changes to permitted development rights creating new homes from non-residential properties. The emphasis of the amendments is on restricting the use of Article 4 Directions to the ‘smallest possible geographical area’.

The revised NPPF forms a significant material consideration in the planning process. In summary, the greater emphasis on design quality and sustainability is welcomed, but the subjective nature of the term ‘beauty’ and the lack of stronger and more comprehensive policy framework in relation to renewable energy and climate change objectives means that an opportunity has been missed. This is particularly disappointing in the context of the UK Government leadership role in the run-up to COP26.

We await the detail of the Planning Bill to understand how the wider planning reforms mooted in the Planning White Paper and ‘Changes to the Planning System’ consultations will introduce further changes in England and perhaps address some of the shortfalls of this new NPPF.

Further information

Contact Alison Broderick or David Jackson

Contact Savills Planning