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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department has plans to reform the planning system to reduce delays to (a) the North West Relief Road in Shrewsbury and (b) other major infrastructure projects.

Given the quasi-judicial nature of the planning system, I cannot comment on this specific project. However, delivering major infrastructure is integral to supporting our levelling up agenda. The department is already consulting on reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).

In addition, the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill gives the Government powers to create a new Infrastructure Levy. As part of this, local authorities will be required to prepare an Infrastructure Delivery Strategy, which will make it clearer for communities as to what infrastructure will be provided, and when. They will be expected to engage with relevant infrastructure providers in determining these strategies.

The department is also bringing forward reforms to the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs) consenting process. We have recently published a cross Government Action Plan, setting out reforms that will streamline and speed up the consenting process for major infrastructure by making it better, faster, greener, fairer and more resilient.