Recommendation 12

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities should ensure that future reforms to the planning system give a larger role to sustainability than is the case in the current planning system. We welcome the Government’s commitment to reviewing the National Planning Policy Framework to ensure it contributes to climate action, but the Net Zero and Heating and Buildings strategies could have said more about the ability of local authorities to use the planning system to shape their communities in ways that reduce carbon emissions. We agree with local authorities continuing to be able to set their own, more extensive, energy efficiency standards for new housing developments. To support making new housing carbon neutral, net zero should be given a central role in the National Planning Policy Framework. This can and should be compatible with the Government’s target to deliver 300,000 new homes a year by the mid-2020s. Net zero should also be embedded in the new national design code and local design codes. Furthermore, local authorities should be given the ability 54 Local government and the path to net zero to include tougher standards in Local Plans as unconditional requirements for all developments. The proposal in the Planning White Paper for local authorities to have a statutory responsibility to produce a Local Plan should also include a requirement that the Local Plan specifically addresses the issue of carbon emissions and how the local authority will ensure developments in their area contribute towards achieving net zero. This will enable local authorities to take a strategic approach about how to foster developments that will help reduce carbon emissions. To ensure that planning authorities have the necessary skills to devise and monitor effective decarbonisation policies we reiterate the recommendation from our recent planning report for £500 million to be invested over four years into funding the planning system.