On 22 July 2008 the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government published the Proposed Changes to the East Midlands Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS) for public consultation. The proposed changes build upon and have significantly evolved from the draft RSS and recommendations made in the Panel Report published in November 2007.
The main proposed changes to the Regional Spatial Strategy include:
Across the region, housing figures have increased by an extra 21,750 per annum between 2006 and 2026 in line with the revised Government targets for housing delivery in the Housing Green Paper published in July 2007, which also highlighted the need to accelerate construction rates to meet the demand for housing and address the issue of housing affordability. Additional housing will be concentrated in and around the cities of Derby, Leicester and Nottingham and additionally in Lincoln, Newark and Grantham.
Affordable rural housing is high on the RSS agenda highlighting the need for affordable housing within rural areas; this is also emphasised within the Commission for Rural Communities’ State of the Countryside report (2008). The need for affordable housing within rural areas is an exceedingly contentious issue which will inevitably cause even more conflict if it is not tackled by local authorities now.
The new policy encourages local authorities and rural housing enablers to consider all options within policy to provide new homes such as using rural exception site policies and the re-use of suitable redundant farm buildings for affordable housing. There also may be opportunity for small scale market housing alongside affordable housing in some larger rural villages.
It is evident that the proposed changes to the RSS emphasise the role of sustainability within the planning system and with the rejection of the Panel’s recommendation to delete the Green Belt areas around Nottingham, there is even more pressure to conform to sustainability criteria and focus the majority of new development in existing urban areas.
For a summary of all the main Proposed Changes to the East Midlands Regional Spatial Strategy visit: http://www.goem.gov.uk/goem/news/regionalplanning/
The public consultation for the Proposed Changes to the East Midlands Regional Spatial Strategy ends at 5pm on 17 October 2008. To comment on the proposed changes visit: http://www.gos.gov.uk/goem/planning/regional-planning/?a=42496
For further information on planning issues, contact Kay Davies on 01530 410824 email kay.davies@fishergerman.co.uk or Marie Stacey on 01530 410844 email marie.stacey@fishergerman.co.uk
