The government’s planning white paper is principally about centralisation and deregulation. Local authority housing targets are to be dictated from Whitehall, local plan processes are to be standardised and “streamlined”, and local development management policies are to be written by civil servants.

At the same time the deregulation agenda boosts permitted development rights to stratospheric levels, granting outline planning permission to growth sites on allocation in the local plan, and permission in principle to specified developments in existing urban areas.

The only areas to escape this deregulatory blitz are conservation areas and other protected areas (I wonder who lives there?).

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