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6 Aug 2018

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Affordable and Social Housing, AONB, Developers/ Development, Housing (local), Land Supply, Planning System, Rural communities

Project Planning Fear: MP Truss says rip up planning rules or get Corbyn!

“A cabinet minister faced a furious backlash yesterday after saying the Tories must build homes in the countryside – or they will hand power to Jeremy Corbyn.

Liz Truss, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, said planning laws should be ripped up as she complained about the number of Nimbys in Britain.

The outspoken minister said ‘a lot more’ sites needed to be opened up. She also called for those living in cities to be allowed to add extra floors to their homes without needing permission. Miss Truss argued the house-building overhaul was needed to keep Mr Corbyn out of Downing Street at the next election.

Liz Truss argued the house-building overhaul was needed to keep Jeremy Corbyn (pictured) out of Downing Street at the next election

But Tory colleagues warned the party would be ‘run out of office’ if it went ahead with ‘catastrophic’ proposals that fail to protect rural Britain and the green belts around London and other major cities.

The row comes a day after campaigners warned the green belt is already being ‘gobbled up at an alarming rate’ to build thousands of homes.

A report from the Campaign to Protect Rural England, published yesterday, showed plans for almost 460,000 homes have been pencilled in for green belt land since 2013 as councils lift planning protections, opening the way for developers.

Asked in an interview whether she would you be happy to ‘start paving over our green and pleasant land’, Miss Truss replied: ‘I do think we need to open up more land for building, a lot more. There are a lot Nimbys in Britain.’

Questioned on whether there are many ‘not in my backyard’ objectors in her own party, she said: ‘There are, but I think it is a dwindling number.

‘People recognise the choice is building on more greenfield sites and making sure there are enough homes for next generation or losing the election and ending up with Jeremy Corbyn, whose policy appears to be appropriating property.

Liz Truss, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, said planning laws should be ripped up as she complained about the number of Nimbys in Britain

‘So I know which one I’d choose – it’s having more homes available on the open market for people of whatever generation to afford.’ The minister added: ‘I also think we need to make it easier to build up in cities. I quite like the Japanese system where essentially you can build up on top of your house without having to get extra planning permission. I think we need to be more liberal about these policies.’

Miss Truss, who was appointed second-in-command at the Treasury last June after previously serving as justice secretary and environment secretary, said in the interview with the Financial Times’ politics podcast that she would one day like to be the country’s first female chancellor. ‘Well, who would say no to that?’ she said.

But when asked if she would like to be prime minister, Miss Truss, who is MP for South West Norfolk, replied: ‘I’m not sure about that one.’

Tory former minister Crispin Blunt last night warned the party it would suffer an electoral ‘catastrophe’ if it does not protect the green belt. The MP for Reigate, who is co-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for London’s green belt, said Conservative local councillors already faced being ‘run out of office’ in areas where ministers had raised housebuilding targets.

‘Residents’ associations are going off their rocket,’ he said.

Mr Blunt said trying to meet demand in the South East was ‘sucking the best and brightest out of the North’. Hindering development in the South-East would encourage growith in the North, he added.

Tom Fyans of the CPRE said: ‘We agree that there is a severe lack of affordable homes available for people to buy and rent.

‘However, what Liz Truss fails to recognise is that, opening up the green belt will not solve this issue.

Tory former minister Crispin Blunt (pictured) last night warned the party it would suffer an electoral ‘catastrophe’ if it does not protect the green belt

‘Almost three quarters of the homes built on green belt land last year were unaffordable.’ He said the ‘perfect solution’ to ‘this barbaric assault on the green belt’ was to use brownfield land to its full capacity.

The CPRE’s report showed there are plans for almost 460,000 homes on green belt land. Green belt areas can be built on if councils grant planning permission directly or remove the land’s official status. Both methods have been used.

Only 70 houses or flats were built in the green belt in 2009/10 compared with 8,143 in 2017/18.

Miss Truss has become one of the most prominent advocates in the Cabinet for free market liberalism. Earlier this year, she attracted attention for a speech in which she appeared to ridicule the Prime Minister’s plan to ban plastic straws.”

http://35.192.208.249/2018/08/07/tory-minister-liz-truss-sparks-fury-after-demanding-laws-protecting-green-fields-are-ripped-up/

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6 Aug 2018

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Accountability, AONB, Developers/ Development, Inequality, Local Plan, NPPF, Planning System, Rural communities

“If we value rural Britain, we can’t build houses all over it”

“Government housing policy has lost all contact with planning Britain’s countryside. This week the Campaign for the Preservation of Rural England (CPRE) is up in arms over house-building in green belts, and over the lack of what it calls affordable housing. These are a distraction. It is planning as such that has collapsed.

The CPRE is concerned that 8,000 houses were built last year on green-belt land, or 24,000 over the past decade, and that hardly any were affordable. This has predictably raised a green light over all green belts, with developers rushing forward with applications for 460,000 new homes now in process. Already, unplanned and sprawling “toy-town” estates are spreading across the home counties, the Fens, the Somerset Levels and the Severn Valley. It has sucked development into the south-east of England, denuded town centres and put ever more pressure on transport corridors. It is the worst sort of “non-planning”.

New green belt housing applications push total to a record 460,000
The issue should not be green-belt building or affordability. All rural land is now in contention. As for affordability – usually 20% off market price – such a subsidy is always short-term, and should never be a loophole for allowing building where it would otherwise be stopped.

New houses in the countryside have intense local impact, yet they form a trivial element in the housing market, of which some 90% involves existing stock. Policy should be aimed at genuinely boosting supply. This means cutting Britain’s shocking underoccupation of existing buildings. It means help with downsizing and subletting. It means not taxing sales, as stamp duty does. It means densifying urban sites and being more flexible on building uses. Modern “green” development is in cities.

Local planning must be restored. The government claims the right to decide how many new people come to Britain. It should grant local people the same right, to control the pace and nature of settlement in their communities. New planning rules deny them that right. They dictate that, should local people fight imposed targets, they will lose any further say in the matter, allowing free rein to development. It is heads we win, tails you lose localism.

Britain’s reputation for town-and-country planning has all but evaporated over the past decade. Each change in planning rules, usually dictated by the building lobby, has drawn ever more of the countryside into speculative play. The solution does not lie in arguing over a few hundred green-belt acres and a few thousand subsidised houses. County land-use planning has to be restored. Landscape considered worthy of long-term preservation – and much of it is still outside national parks – should be “listed” for its scenic and environmental value, like conservation areas in towns. Other land could then be declared a potentially developable land bank.

Listing the landscape would replace the present fighting with proper planning. Everyone would know where they stood. Rural Britain would not, as now, be up for speculative land grab. The old mistakes would not be repeated.”

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/06/planning-system-uk-landscapes-listing-rural-britain

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East Devon Watch

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6 Aug 2018

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Accountability, Air pollution, AONB, Developers/ Development, Fords of Sidmouth, Hugo Swire, Planning System, Sidford Business Park, Sustainability, Transport (local)

Swire opposes Sidford Business Park

“Hundreds of people have lodged objections against the controversial application to create 8,445 sq m of employment floor space at the Two Bridges site.

The plans, which could create 250 jobs, represents 37 per cent of what was previously proposed and submitted to East Devon District Council (EDDC) in 2016.

Sir Hugo has hit out at the plans and raised concerns, slamming it as an ‘unwanted development in the wrong place’.

In a letter to East Devon District Council’s leader Councillor Ian Thomas, Sir Hugo said: “We have already seen Sidford absorbed by Sidmouth. It was because of this that I objected to a proposal for a cycle path between Sidford and Sidbury as I believed it would not be long before someone insisted on an illuminated path which could lead to gradual urbanisation between the two.

“Likewise, it seems to me to build a business park between Sidford and Sidbury, albeit nearer to Sidford, is an unwanted development in the wrong place.

“You will be familiar with the well-rehearsed arguments both for and against but I cannot see how this proposed development would do anything but detract from the area and to lead to more congestion and pollution on what is an already overused road.

“Equally I cannot see why the Alexandria Business Park could not be properly redeveloped to accommodate any need for new light industrial space.”

Sir Hugo then urged the council to turn the ‘unwanted’ planning application down.

Say No to Sidford Business Park campaigners held a protest last week that was attended by more than 80 people.

Petitioners have also been going door-to-door to gauge people’s views.

A Say No to Sidford Business Park spokesman said: “Obviously we welcome the position taken by Sir Hugo on what is a very important issue for local people. On this matter, we feel he has got it completely right.”

When the Herald went to press, EDDC had received 368 comments about the application, 254 of which were objections and 111 of which were in support.”

http://www.sidmouthherald.co.uk/news/mp-sir-hugo-swire-opposes-plans-for-new-business-park-at-sidford-1-5637131

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3 Aug 2018

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Accountability, AONB, Austerity cuts, Developers/ Development, National Planning Policy Framework, Planning System

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The Times: “The ruinous planning policy MPs don’t want you to know about”

If The Times is worried, everyone should be worried!

“To save you the eye strain, or possibly to sublimate some Freudian desire for self-flagellation, I have waded through all 73 pages of the government’s National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). Slipped out last week under cover of Brexit, the document that will shape the look of England for years to come was duly awarded minimal coverage by the press.

I partly blame its clunky title. If the NPPF were called “Why a ghastly housing estate will soon be built just outside your favourite village” it would get a lot more attention. Still, at least the name of the minister responsible for it — the housing and communities secretary, James Brokenshire — has an ominous ring.

The trouble with having a “national plan” for anything, as Russia found in the 1930s, is that what seem like good ideas to centralised bureaucrats tend to collide with overlooked local realities to produce unforeseen catastrophes. I fear that’s the case with the NPPF, particularly since it covers everything from new housing and the future of town centres to protecting the environment, dealing with floods, promoting sustainable transport, rolling out broadband and preserving historic buildings.

Take its emphasis on “good design”. On paper, that’s admirable. Theoretically it gives local councils the power to reject those soulless estates of identical, boxy homes beloved of the big developers. The aim is to ensure that all new developments excite the eye, please their residents and enhance their environments as much as, say, Ralph Erskine’s celebrated Byker Wall in Newcastle. That would be a fine aspiration if local councils had the experts, time, resources and money to match what any big housing developer can deploy in a planning battle.

Unfortunately, thanks to central government’s ruinous cuts to their budgets, they don’t. Some, such as almost bankrupt Northamptonshire, can hardly run their bin collections let alone turn themselves into architectural watchdogs. For every Byker Wall built in the future, there are still likely to be a hundred soulless “off-the-peg” estates nodded through by councillors too helpless to resist.

And there’s a new threat. From November local authorities will have to comply with a “housing delivery test”. It will penalise those that fail to conjure up an agreed number of new homes in their area. Again the intentions are good: to bridge the enormous gap between the number of new homes given planning permission by councils and the number actually built by the developers. Councils will have to police much more thoroughly the progress of approved building applications — another strain on their scant resources.

The real worry, though, is that councils will panic because they aren’t meeting the set targets and will nod through schemes of scant architectural and social merit, repeating the appalling mistakes made in the 1950s and 1960s. No wonder that the Campaign to Protect Rural England has called the combined effect of the new planning rulebook and the housing delivery test “a speculative developers’ charter” that will result in councils and communities having “little control over the location and type of developments that take place”.

On town centres too, the NPPF seems to be living in a bygone age. The big problem in the next ten years won’t be banning ugly shopfronts or propping up small independent butchers and bookshops, or even halting the march of out-of-town shopping malls. It will be ensuring that there are any shops left, as the relentless shift to online retail gathers pace. As town centres fast become boarded-up wastelands, local authorities need the power (and the money) to make much more imaginative interventions. Yet the NPPF has nothing to say about this.

I find its paragraphs about protecting England’s green belts a bit weaselly too. These sacrosanct meadows are apparently safe from development except where local authorities have “exhausted all other reasonable options”. OK, but who decides what “exhausted” and “reasonable” mean? And there’s another glaring loophole. When it comes to brownfield sites inside green belt areas, it’s apparently a free-for-all.

There’s much that is sensible in the NPPF, of course. If I were an ancient woodland, for instance, I would feel better protected from rape by chainsaw. Nevertheless, my overall impression is that the bureaucrats who penned this well-meaning document imagine that England is still a country of communities safeguarded by strong, efficient local authorities. The sad truth is that government ministers have spent the past eight years paying lip service to “localism” while running down the democratic institutions that preserve it. Brokenshire’s legacy could well be broken shires.”

Source: Times (pay wall)

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28 Jul 2018

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Accountability, Developers/ Development, Development Management Committee, Planning System, Scrutiny, Transparency

“Manchester launches consultation on planning system reform”

“Manchester City Council has set out measures it says will “improve the transparency” of the planning process, including adding public viability assessments for new housing projects.

The council has started a consultation on the changes, which it says would signal “a new approach for developer contributions”.

Among the key changes will be the inclusion of affordable housing statements and viability assessments for all new housing projects; typically, viability statements are not typically made available on the city’s planning portal.

The council said public affordable housing statements would “provide an overview of the affordability ambition of a new development”. Currently, the council stipulates that 20% of new homes should be designated as affordable.

Under the consultation, it is proposed that affordable housing statements are made public for schemes of 15 or more homes. Where no affordable housing is proposed, a full, un-redacted copy of the viability assessment will need to be submitted.

Meanwhile, the inclusion of viability assessments would allow the public to scrutinise developer requirements for Section 106 contributions.

These will be required when a project does not “include the necessary policy provision or financial contributions”, justified on viability grounds.

Viability assessments will need to be provided “in its entirety,” according to the consultation guidelines. This includes the purchase process, purchase costs, estimated construction costs, professional fees, land acquisition price, and estimated profit and developer target returns.

The consultation is now open and is set to run until 14 September, and the documents can be accessed here.

Cllr Angeliki Stogia, Manchester City Council’s executive member for environment, planning and transport, said: “We want the people of Manchester to have faith in the planning process so they know the decisions being made have been fully scrutinised and where possible, Section 106 is being negotiated working with developers on larger developments.

“This consultation signals a new approach for developer contributions so that everyone who has an interest in the planning process is clear whether affordable housing contributions will underpin new development in the city.

“The move towards publication of viability assessments and affordable housing statements mark the first step in making the process more open and transparent bolstering our clear commitment to affordable housing through the planning process.”

https://www.placenorthwest.co.uk/news/manchester-launches-consultation-on-planning-system-reform/

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26 Jul 2018

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Affordable and Social Housing, Developers/ Development, Development Management Committee, EDDC, Local Plan, National Planning Policy Framework, Neighbourhood Plans, Planning System

New planning rules = developer free-for-all again

As Owl understands it (feel free to correct) Local Plans and Neighbourhood Plans are now basically ripped up unless developers are BUILDING just about everything for which they have permission (building, not land-banking).

A new “Housing Delivery Test” will apply from November 2018. If DEVELOPERS have not built enough homes using these calculations COUNCILS will be penalised by having planning decisions taken from them and DEVELOPERS WILL BE ALLOWED TO BUILD JUST ABOUT ANYWHERE. Just like the old days when we had no Local Plan. Neighbourhood plans will then also count for nothing.

As the CPRE points out:

“…Rather than delivering ‘what communities want’ as it claims to promise, the new planning rulebook and its new ‘housing delivery test’ will result in almost all local plans becoming out of date within two years. It is a speculative developers’ charter and will lead to the death of the plan-led system.

“Without a local plan, councils and communities have little control over the location and type of developments that take place. This results in the wrong developments in the wrong places – local communities’ needs are ignored and valued countryside destroyed for no good reason.”

https://www.pbctoday.co.uk/news/planning-construction-news/revised-national-planning-policy-framework-provokes-mixed-feelings/43866/

Nice one, Tories!

For the geeks amongst us, the methodology of the “Housing Delivery Test” – (9 pages) which will be implemented from November 2018 – is here:

Click to access HDT_Measurement_Rule_Book.pdf

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25 Jul 2018

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Affordable and Social Housing, Developers/ Development, Housing (local), National Planning Policy Framework, Planning System

CPRE adds its voice to major criticisms of National Planning Policy Framework

“The Campaign to Protect Rural England has labelled the revised National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) a ‘speculative developers’ charter’, as the government published its new planning rulebook earlier today (24 July).

Despite a promise to ‘build attractive and better-designed homes in areas where they are needed’, CPRE points out that far from fulfilling this promise, the NPPF will continue to favour the delivery of any development, rather than development that meets communities’ needs, respects the environment, and adheres to policies in the NPPF other than those which deal with housing delivery.

CPRE’s key concern is the new ‘housing delivery test’. The NPPF continues to encourage councils to set high targets for housing delivery and this new policy has been produced to enforce this delivery. However, the ‘housing delivery test’ will penalise councils when house builders fail to deliver homes in their areas by removing local control over planning decisions. This in turn will leave them and the countryside open to speculative development.

CPRE have a number of other concerns, including:

a failure to provide an effective brownfield first policy

the continuing failure to support provision of affordable housing in rural areas

the discouragement of neighbourhood planning because of uncertainty over the validity of plans older than two years

continued implicit support for hydraulic fracturing for shale oil and gas, despite massive public opposition and little evidence of need
Matt Thomson, Head of Planning at the Campaign to Protect Rural England, said:

‘Rather than delivering “what communities want” as it claims to promise, the new planning rulebook and its new “housing delivery test” will result in almost all local plans becoming out of date within two years. It is a speculative developers’ charter and will lead to the death of the plan-led system.

‘Without a local plan, councils and communities have little control over the location and type of developments that take place. This results in the wrong developments in the wrong places – local communities’ needs are ignored and valued countryside destroyed for no good reason.’

Despite heavy criticism of the revised NPPF, CPRE are pleased to see that government has taken some positive actions.

They include:

National Parks and AONBs reinstated as having the ‘highest status of protection’

maintaining Green Belt protections and an improved definition ‘exceptional circumstances’ for releasing land from Green Belts

improved clarity and focus for policies on making better use of land

clearer guidance for viability assessment and that price paid for land should never be a justification for viability revisions

excluding National Parks, AONBs and Green Belts from the Entry Level Exceptions Sites policy

‘Social housing’ being reinstated in the definition of affordable housing.
CPRE will be providing further analysis of the revised NPPF shortly.”

http://www.cpre.org.uk/media-centre/sound-bites/item/4923-new-planning-rulebook-heavily-criticised-by-cpre

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25 Jul 2018

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Affordable and Social Housing, Developers/ Development, National Planning Policy Framework, Planning System

More planners criticise new National Planning Policy Framework

“Communities face “punishment” if developers fail to build enough homes in their areas, the Local Government Association (LGA) has warned after the Government published a revised version of the National Planning Policy Framework.

Housing and Communities Secretary James Brokenshire said the new NPPF would make it easier for councils to challenge poor quality and unattractive development, and “give communities a greater voice about how developments should look and feel”.

But the LGA’s Conservative chair Lord Porter said: “It is hugely disappointing that the Government has not listened to our concerns about nationally set housing targets, and will introduce a delivery test that punishes communities for homes not built by private developers.

“Councils work hard with communities to get support for good quality housing development locally, and there is a risk these reforms will lead to locally agreed plans being bypassed by national targets.”

Mr Brokenshire said the revised NPPF would promote high quality design of new homes and places, give better environmental protection, secure “the right number of homes in the right places” and put greater responsibility and accountability for housing delivery on councils and developers.

It also gives a new method for councils to calculate housing need and from November 2018 imposes the housing delivery test to which the LGA objects.
This will penalise councils in areas where insufficient homes are built.
Lord Porter said: “Planning is not a barrier to housebuilding, and councils are approving nine out of 10 applications.

“To boost the supply of homes and affordability, it is vital to give councils powers to ensure homes with permission are built, enable all councils to borrow to build, keep 100 per cent of Right to Buy receipts and set discounts locally.”

Other major changes from the original NPPF include making it easier for councils to refuse permission for developments on grounds of poor design, and a more explicit protection for green belts.

Royal Town Planning Institute president John Acres welcomed clearer definitions of concepts like ‘sustainable development’ but warned about, “the significant pressure the new NPPF requirements will put on local authority planning teams”.

Acres added: “It is imperative that chief executives, council leaders and politicians resource planning departments sufficiently, particularly as they will now be held more accountable for delivery under the housing delivery test and are expected to carry out more regular reviews of their plans.”

http://localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=36155%3Acouncils-criticise-delivery-test-as-revised-national-planning-policy-framework-issued&catid=63&Itemid=31

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East Devon Watch

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25 Jul 2018

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Accountability, Affordable and Social Housing, Developers/ Development, Development Management Committee, EDDC, Housing (local), National Planning Policy Framework

RIP EDDC Development Management Committee and goodbye Local Plans

“Council chiefs today warned the Government was creating a developers’ charter that could see local objections to house building ignored to hit targets.

Under new rules unveiled today, housebuilders would be able to ignore local plans for mapping areas for homes if fewer than 75 per cent of those required by Whitehall targets for 2020 are constructed.

It means in some cases developers could be able to override a rejection of planning permission by appealing over local councillors.

The Local Government Association (LGA) claimed the new ‘housing delivery test’ would ‘punish communities’ opposed to bad developments.

The test is part of the new national policy planning framework (NPPF) announced by Communities Secretary James Brokenshire on Tuesday.

Mr Brokenshire said the rules would create a planning system ‘fit for the future’ which married requirements for building numbers, build quality and environmental requirements.

But Lord Porter, chairman of the LGA, said the plan failed to give councils the powers they needed ‘to ensure homes with planning permission are built out quickly, with the necessary infrastructure, in their local communities’.

He said: ‘It is hugely disappointing that the Government has not listened to our concerns about nationally set housing targets, and will introduce a delivery test that punishes communities for homes not built by private developers.

‘Councils work hard with communities to get support for good-quality housing development locally, and there is a risk these reforms will lead to locally agreed plans being bypassed by national targets.

‘Planning is not a barrier to housebuilding, and councils are approving nine out of 10 applications.

‘To boost the supply of homes and affordability, it is vital to give councils powers to ensure homes with permission are built, enable all councils to borrow to build, keep 100 per cent of Right to Buy receipts and set discounts locally.’

In a written ministerial statement Mr Brokenshire told the Commons that the NPPF ‘provides greater certainty for local authorities in the decision-making and planning appeals processes’, adding: ‘A new Housing Delivery Test will also measure delivery of homes, with consequences for under-delivery.’

The British Property Federation said it welcomed the test.

Ian Fletcher, its director of real estate policy, said: ‘This will provide a consistent measure against which different local authorities’ performances can be compared.

This is the way that the Government will deliver on its housing promises, and as importantly, cater for a generation that wants to have a home to call their own.’

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5987591/Council-chiefs-claim-planning-overhaul-developers-charter.html

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East Devon Watch

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19 Jul 2018

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Asset Management Group, Asset sweating, Austerity cuts, Coastal communities, Developers/ Development, EDDC, Exmouth, Regeneration

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EDDC flogging off the Ocean Centre Exmouth – well, it might cover a bit of the new HQ bill!

“According to agent Vickery Holman Property Consultants, Ocean Blue, in The Esplanade, is on the market for £2,700,000.

The facility, which opened its doors for the first time in 2012, has 12-lane 10-pin bowling, a gaming area and the Ocean Bar and Grill, with a seating capacity of 100 on the first floor and a large children’s soft play area and café for 22 children.

On the second floor, there is a function suite, bar and two outside terraces which has become a popular wedding venue with a capacity for 350 people.

The complete site is subject to a 125-year lease with East Devon District Council and was sublet to LED Leisure Ltd for 25 years in 2015.

The Journal understands this agreement will not be affected by the sale of the site.”

http://www.exmouthjournal.co.uk/news/exmouth-s-ocean-goes-on-the-market-for-2-700-000-1-5612363

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18 Jul 2018

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Accountability, Affordable and Social Housing, Austerity cuts, Developers/ Development, Inequality, Privatisation, Scrutiny

Privatisation – more evidence of the downside – Housing sale and leaseback

“A “disastrous” Ministry of Defence property deal could get worse when rental rates are reviewed in 2021, MPs have said.

The MoD’s sale and leaseback arrangement in 1996 with Annington Property Limited had left the department between £2.2bn and £4.2bn worse off over the first 21 years of the contract.

The Public Accounts Committee said the deal has been “disastrous for taxpayers” but could cost them even more when rent is reviewed from 2021.

PAC chair Meg Hillier said: “Taxpayers have lost billions as a result of this appalling deal and there could be worse to come if the MoD fares poorly in rent negotiations.

“The uncertainty over those negotiations is a further slap in the face for those forces families who, for far too long, have endured poor standards of subsidised accommodation.”

Under the deal, agreed during John Major’s time as prime minister, 55,000 houses were sold by the MoD to Annington before being rented back on 200-year leases.

A report by the National Audit Office in January found that rising housing prices since the deal was agreed had left the government between £2.2bn and £4.2bn worse off than it would have been if it had kept the properties.

The rents Annington charges the MoD for the houses – subject to a 58% downwards adjustment to date – are expected to increase significantly when the current agreement ends in 2021.

In its report, which was published on Friday, the PAC said that the average annual cost to rent, manage and maintain each property is £7,807 and recommended the MoD develop a plan to reduce the number of empty properties.

The committee said that the number of empty properties currently stands at more than 10,000 – roughly the same as 21 years ago – despite a 30% fall in the total number of properties rented back from Annington over that period.

It said it was “scandalous that the department still holds so many empty properties at a time of a national housing shortage, and has made almost no progress in 20 years in reducing the number.”

https://www.publicfinance.co.uk/news/2018/07/accounts-committee-blasts-mod-property-deal

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16 Jul 2018

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Accountability, Austerity cuts, Conflict of interest, Developers/ Development, Inequality, Local Government Finance, Scrutiny, Transparency

“Rise of dealmaker CEOs puts governance skills ‘at risk’ “

“The rise of the commercially-minded “dealmaker” as a local authority chief executive requires a “reappraisal” of council governance skills, according to CIPFA chief executive Rob Whiteman.

Whiteman spoke to Room151 at the 2018 CIPFA conference in Bournemouth, explaining the need for his organisation’s new financial resilience index.

Whiteman said that it made sense for many councils to appoint chief executives with commercial skills, but added that traditional oversight skills are in danger of being lost.

“Councils are now understandably appointing dealmakers, and that is good in terms of developing their commercial and their development opportunities.

“But there is a risk to that. For want of a better word, the town clerk element of being a chief executive is under pressure.

“This is the element which insists on good governance; that insists on options being looked at; that gives advice on there being a fit and proper relationship between officers and members, where officers can speak truth unto power and can give an opinion even if that opinion is unwelcome.”

Whiteman said that hand-in-hand with improved commercial know-how, councils must have “a reappraisal of governance skills because we are placing the taxpayer and public at more risk unless we strengthen the safeguards and assurances that we have”.

He added: “If we are going to have more dealmakers we have to have better governance and better assurance.”

Whiteman said CIPFA’s new index is a necessary response to the decision earlier this year by Northamptonshire County Council to issue a section 114 notice bringing a halt to all but essential spending.

“There is a strong feeling that, as the body that regulates professional conduct and the quality of financial management support in local government, we need to take steps to acknowledge that Northamptonshire was a failure of sector-led improvement.”

Northamptonshire’s section 114 notice was issued in February, five months after a financial peer review commissioned by the Local Government Association raised a number of issues with the authority’s financial management.

“The advice from Max Caller, the independent inspector of Northamptonshire, is that a section 114 notice should have been served earlier and, if it had been, it may have stopped the authority getting to a position which, to the lay person, was one of insolvency,” Whiteman said.

He went onto say that in some authorities, a lack of effective communication between finance officers and top level council decision makers can hinder efforts to avoid financial problems.

He said: “I speak to finance officers who think they are not being listened to by the corporate management team or by members or by the chief executive. On the other hand, I could speak to corporate managers, or members or chief executives, who think finance officers are not listening to them.

“What we cannot allow, as a sector, is the position that people might be heading for financial failure and they don’t know it.”

The proposed resilience index is also intended to help prevent a culture of denial leading to overlooked financial problems , Whiteman said.

“The reason that CIPFA is looking at the index is to make sure we have an alternative to speculation that can be dismissed or discounted.”

He said the index was driven by a need to ensure council finances were heading in the right direction.

“That is not only good for those councils but it is good for the sector,” he said.

Whiteman said that CIPFA would produce the index using its in-house team of 30 analysts, would not take sponsorship to fund it and would not charge councils for it.

“It is important that an independent body such as CIPFA produces a way of warning where failure could occur in a few years’ time,” he said.

“If CIPFA doesn’t do it, who else would do it? And, if nobody does it, could we have other Northamptonshire style failures?”

http://www.room151.co.uk/funding/rob-whiteman-rise-of-dealmaker-ceos-puts-governance-skills-at-risk/

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

16 Jul 2018

Posted under

Accountability, Austerity cuts, Developers/ Development, Local Government Finance

Profligate, cost-cutting council …

No (not yet) EDDC but Hounslow:

“Hounslow Council has spent more than £25million of taxpayers’ money employing external consultants to advise it over the past three-and-a-half years.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request submitted by the BBC Local Democracy Reporting Service shows the council spent £25,018,721 on consultant fees between the start of 2015 and the most up to date available in 2018.

The biggest area of spend was in consultancy on business matters which was £12,103,360 over the period, equating to more than £3million each year.

The second highest area of spend was £7,777,769 on property consultancy.

To put the figure in context, the council’s total spend for the 2018/2019 financial year will be £139million, whereas in 2014/2015 financial year it was £182.7m. …”

https://www.getwestlondon.co.uk/news/west-london-news/hounslow-council-spends-25million-consultants-14911545

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

12 Jul 2018

Posted under

Accountability, Developers/ Development, Persimmon, Sleaze

Persimmon in another rip-off scandal

See what Guardian Money had to say in answer to this query – truly shocking:

“I am about to complete on the purchase of a house on a new Charles Church development in Northiam, East Sussex.

My solicitor has identified an issue which negatively affects the value of seven of the properties. Because a certain form was never submitted to the Land Registry by the developer, each one has an “overage” on its deeds in favour of Charles Church.

This grants the company a proportion of any profit if the property is sold on and will have a huge impact on the resale value. The owners of properties already sold are none the wiser as no other conveyancer had picked up on it.

Charles Church’s solicitor has agreed that, with this overage in place, there is no way I could purchase the property. Nevertheless, Charles Church has given me two days to exchange and complete, or else it will remarket the property.”

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2018/jul/12/new-build-clawback-overage-persimmon-complete-survey

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