The Duty to Co-operate

The Government now requires LAs either to prepare cross boundary plans or to ‘settle’ cross boundary matters via a Duty to Co-operate, which is now a key legal test in local plan making.

It has already emerged that the Duty is problematical. Recent research contained within ‘Housing & Planning 2013’ undertaken by Building Product, reported that, of 16 Heads of Planning interviewed, 15 were of the opinion that the Duty alone would not address contentious cross boundary matters. The greatest tensions are likely to be between constrained urban authorities and their adjacent rural neighbours; for example Coventry has recently had its plan found unsound.

Jonathan Steele (Director, Southampton) comments: “In South Hampshire, where co-operation was previously well established through the Partnership for Urban South Hampshire (PUSH), the planned housing, and some past commitments to Strategic Development Locations, are being dropped, largely for political gain. We await the first real test of the Duty in the PUSH area which may be seen in Eastleigh or Test Valley Boroughs, where the pressures for accommodating growth from adjacent Southampton are greatest”.

In a recent case between North Somerset Council and The University of Bristol (14 February 2013 Judgement), the High Court judged that the Inspector had erred in law in not providing adequate conclusions (based on interpretation of the facts) in respect of the overall reduced housing requirement which North Somerset had sought. This will have implications should North Somerset be required to prepare and resubmit their whole plan, as it would then have to comply with the Duty, and hence have regard to the growth needs of Bristol. This could trigger a Green Belt Review.

Development Plan Hiatus

The NPPF makes clear that new development plans should be ‘positively prepared’ in order that planning decisions are made locally against up to date evidence.

In practice Savills is finding significant differences across the Southern Half of England in LAs’ success in achieving the NPPF requirement (see Graph 2).

This is in part because the 2004 Planning & Compulsory Purchase Act, which introduced the ability to ‘split’ a development plan, resulted in most LAs devoting time and resources to producing only a Core Strategy, which does not include site allocations.

The NPPF and more recent amendments to the Regulations re-introduce the single ‘Local Plan’, which should help delivery. There is a significant amount to do before there is up-to-date coverage of plans containing the allocations required to meet needs.

Only 12 LAs have had Core Strategies (or ‘new style’ Local Plans) examined and adopted since the introduction of the NPPF in March 2012 (6.3%). There are a further 25 LAs which are currently at examination, hoping to get to adoption soon. Across the whole of England, 71% of LAs do at least have a published draft according to Planning Inspectorate statistics, but even this indicates much work still to be done.

Colin Campbell (Director, Cambridge) comments: “Despite the encouragement of the NPPF for authorities to keep plans up to date, progress remains patchy and slow. Many authorities are finding it difficult to deal with the responsibility and consequences of identifying and meeting objectively assessed needs.

With the gradual revocation of Regional Strategies and many Local Plans being given only limited weight from 27th March, the NPPF will become even more important for decisions on planning applications until new style local plans are adopted. Given that some LAs have not yet replaced their old style local plans with new ones, it is likely that the NPPF will be the basis for decision-making on planning applications for quite some time.”

Taken from
Spotlight: National Planning Policy Framework - One Year On