Housing secretary Michael Gove yesterday unveiled the government’s long-awaited new National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), vowing to clampdown on planning delays and abolishing the requirement for local authorities to allocate greenfield land to meet its new homes targets.

The NPPF has been in development for the past 12 months and has had more than 26,000 respondents to its consultation launched in December last year.

Gove says says the intention of the new framework is to help speed up planning and boost brownfield developments, while also holding low-delivering local authorities to account.

Key proposals set out by Gove include:

+ Abolishing requirements for local authorities to allocate greenfield land to meet their housing targets

+ Providing resources to make the planning system work better, with the introduction of a new ‘super squad’ of leading planners to unblock major housing developments

+ Ensuring every local authority is held to account for delivery against its plan, the speed with which planning applications are processed and the rationality of their decision-making

+ Launching a review into the statutory consultee system to look at whether the group of consultees is right and whether the absence of a reply within an appropriate timeline should be a green light rather than a red one

+ Forcing local authorities to set aside land to be developed by small builders in an attempt to increase competition in the sector and reduce the dominance of large developers

+ Launching a review of London’s current housing plans to boost delivery

Gove commented: “I want us to be at the forefront of innovation, re-imagining and regenerating our great cities, commissioning new homes of beauty designed to endure. We have listened to thoughtful and measured concerns about how the planning system has worked and made sensitive, practical improvements.

“The role of planners is critical, but their expertise is undervalued by some local authorities. We will provide the resource to make the planning system work better. I will make sure every local authority is held to account for delivery against its plan, for the speed with which planning applications are processed and the rationality of their decision-making.”

But there has been a mixed response to the plans proposed by the government.

Property industry responds after Gove officially waters down housing targets