A government cross-party committee has taken aim at the government’s Levelling Up bill, saying it does ‘little to reassure’ the policy is ‘more than a slogan.’
The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee has written to Secretary of State Greg Clark to say the bill in its current form is ineffective and lacks detail.
In particular, the committee has concerns about planning provisions included in the bill which could result in councils having less say over planning decisions in their own area.
The government’s housing strategy was also brought into question, as it is currently unclear how the target of 300,000 new homes every year will be met.
The government has centred Levelling Up at the heart of its policy, but recent research found the agenda has done little to elevate forgotten areas and has, in fact, deepened the north-south divide.
Chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, Clive Betts MP said: ‘In its current form, the Bill does little to reassure that levelling up will prove to be more than just a slogan and that we will have meaningful change in local communities across the country. In key areas, it is unclear how the Government intends to drive change and they are yet to commit to the spending that is necessary to level up the country.’
The committee faced a lot of difficulty in fully scrutinising the bill, as there was not enough detail with Andrew Wood, Spatial Planning Lead, CPRE, being told by the government: ‘Trust us a little bit. It will be fine when you see the details.’
Mr Betts said: ‘Our inquiry has focused on the planning provisions in the Bill, which can be described as loosely connected proposals to tinker with the current system, hopefully achieving some improvement. It has been difficult to conduct scrutiny due to a lot of the detail of the provisions having not yet been published. We were asked by the Secretary of State to give our view, and our advice is that more information is provided on what the Government’s intentions are, and that the Government states unambiguously that it is not seeking to centralise planning decisions.’
The bill is focused on reforming the planning system to allow communities to get the infrastructure they need, such as hospitals and schools.
Councils will also be allowed to bring vacant properties back into use and revitalise empty high streets through Compulsory Purchase Orders (CPOs).
Photo by Benjamin Elliott
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