The National Planning Policy Framework has “failed to make a significant impact” on the percentage of planning permissions granted by local authorities in the two years since its introduction, according to new research.
Analysis of more than 1.7m planning applications and 16,000 appeals over four years by planning consultancy Turley shows approvals and rejections have remained broadly the same at 80 per cent and 20 per cent. There has, however, been a significant increase in the success of some types of planning appeals, with rates for public inquiries climbing by as much as 50 per cent since the introduction of the NPPF. There has only been a modest increase in successful appeals by hearing and no change in those through written representations.
Rob Peters, executive director at Turley, said: “There are a range of factors that can influence planning outcomes and the decision to approve or refuse applications is not solely related to national policy. However, it is a reasonable assumption that the combination of less guidance and a strong presumption in favour of sustainable development would result in more planning applications being approved. This has not been the case.”
He added that the variations in the success of different forms of planning appeals could be partly explained by “the failure of local authorities to formulate and adopt local plans to the timescale envisaged in the NPPF”. “To date, the Planning Inspectorate reports that just 14.6 per cent of development plans have been found sound and adopted since the NPPF was published,” Peters said.
“Given the importance of having an up-to-date local plan, especially one that deals with an area’s objectively assessed housing needs and the duty to cooperate with adjoining authorities, it is perhaps not surprising that major residential schemes are enjoying greater success at appeal.”
http://www.localgovernmentexecutive.co.uk/news/nppf-has-little-impact-planning-approvals
So, one has to ask, what was the NPPF actually FOR and how come it has made a very significant impact in East Devon yet not elsewhere.
Now, that reminds us – the East Devon Business Forum Task and Finish Group …
East Devon Watch 
I am certainly unclear why the Govt introduced the NPPF – and with the benefit of hindsight (or possibly foresight) what the **** it has to do with the stated purpose of localism.
I cannot speak with knowledge about whether it has an impact elsewhere, however as they say “there are lies, damn lies and statistics” and this could be an example of this. For instance, although the percentages of applications approved or refused may be the same, that doesn’t mean that the volume is the same, or that they haven’t grown massively in size.
Nor does it mean that under the old regime, the same proportion of applications would have been approved / rejected – it is quite possible (or based on the ED experience likely) that the size and scale has increased, and that under the old regime more of these would have been refused, but that under the NPPF the council feel’s less able to refuse due to the “presumption” for development, the lack of a Local Plan and the increased likelihood of appeals and the costs of fighting them.
We should also note that if the proportions for approval have remained at 80/20, but the number of appeals and of successful appeals have increased, then the net result after appeals might be (say) 90/10 which IS a significant change.
And of course, as any statistician knows, when you talk about averages like the Turley report does, this hides any information about the variance from average. To illustrate this, the following two sets of numbers both have an average of 5: “4,4,5,5,5,5,6,6” and “0,5,5,6,6,6,6,6”. So, a big difference in planning in East Devon can easily be hidden by small changes elsewhere.
Additionally, the Turley report rightly identifies the importance of having a sound Local Plan but makes no mention of the chaos created by introducing the NPPF without notice / lead time to allow councils to have a Local Plan in place when the NPPF came into force.
And of course, the Turley Report says nothing about this being a pilot for privatised policy setting.
LikeLike