Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what plans he has to bring forward legislative proposals to reduce further the regulatory barriers to housebuilding on brownfield land.

The Housing White Paper set out the Government’s ambitious programme to bring brownfield land back into use in England. We have already introduced a requirement for local planning authorities to publish a statutory brownfield land register by the end of 2017, which will identify which previously developed sites are suitable for housing. Local authorities will be able to grant permission in principle, on suitable sites in their registers. This will provide early certainty about the suitability of sites for housing-led development before detailed and often costly development proposals need to be provided. Permission in principle will reduce risk for developers and improve the efficiency of the planning process for the benefit of all users.

It is our intention to introduce permission in principle by application for small sites later in the year, and we expect this will be a particularly helpful tool for small and medium sized builders developing on brownfield land.