Environment Protection: Planning

(asked on 8th December 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps he is taking to ensure that local communities are consulted on the environmental impact of the proposed developments for (a) growth and (b) renewal zones outlined in the Planning for the Future White Paper.


Answered by
Christopher Pincher Portrait
Christopher Pincher
This question was answered on 16th December 2020

Our proposals are designed to put effective community engagement at the heart of planning. The current planning system has a poor record in this area, with information that is hard to find, and difficult to understand.

By taking a digital-first approach to modernise the planning process, we can use new tools and platforms to make it easier for people to understand what is being proposed, and to feed their views into the system at the right time. This will help ensure local people can have real influence over both the location and design of development, and have a meaningful say over its environmental implications.

They will be able to do this both at the plan-making stage – when the important decisions are being made about the scale and location of growth – and as the details of proposed developments come forward. We have proposed a quicker, simpler framework for assessing environmental effects to support this: one which will be easier for communities to engage with, while protecting what matters and leaving an inheritance of environmental improvement.

We are grateful for the many responses received to these proposals. They are being analysed at present, and we will take them into account as we consider how to move forward.

Reticulating Splines