Incorporating HC 813-i-iv, session 2007-08

This White Paper sets out the Government's detailed proposals for the reform of the planning system, in light of the recommendations made by the Barker Review of Land Use Planning (2006, ISBN 9780118404853) and the Eddington Transport Study (2006, ISBN 9780118404877). These proposals are designed to ensure the planning system can meet a number of challenges including: climate change, supporting sustainable economic development, increasing the supply of housing, protecting and enhancing the environment and natural resources, improving local and national infrastructure and maintaining security of energy supply. For the first time, the reforms cover all development consent regimes, including those for major energy, water, transport and waste development, as well as the town and country planning system. The proposals are based on five core principles: i) responsiveness and integration of economic, social and environmental objectives to deliver sustainable development; ii) a planning system which is streamlined efficient and predictable; iii) full and fair opportunities for public consultation and community engagement; iv) transparency and accountability; and v) planning decisions taken at the right level of government, whether national, regional or local.

This accessible book is about local democracy, civic engagement, political participation and community in Britain. It rejects the many pessimistic accounts that seek to dominate our political discourse with their talk of political apathy, community breakdown and selfish individualism The book focuses on local democratic politics in Britain over the last decade and a half, from the election of the New Labour government right up to the current Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government. It includes an analysis of local democracy, civic engagement and participation across a range of policy areas and in the context of debates around accountability, legitimacy, sustainability, localism and the 'big society'. Drawing on a wide range of examples, it argues that local democracy is a vibrant terrain of innovation, civic engagement and participation, and dynamic community activity, with a wide variety of informal and formal activity taking place.

In recent years there have been several alarming predictions about the future of the planet’s fish stocks. As a result, many national governments and supranational institutions, including the European Union, have instituted reforms designed to mitigate the crisis. This book examines the discourse and practice of ‘good governance’ in the context of fisheries management. It starts by examining the ‘crisis’ of fisheries in the North Sea, caused primarily by overfishing and failure of the European Union’s Common Fisheries Policy. It then goes on to analyse reforms to this policy enacted and planned between 2002 and 2013, and the proposition that collapse of fish stocks could occur as a result of deficiencies in new governing arrangements, i.e. failure to apply ‘principles of good governance’. The book argues that impediments to good governance practice in fisheries are not merely the result of implementation deficits, but that they constitute a more systematic failure. Governance theory addresses issues of power, but it does not recognise the many important spatially contingent and relational forms of power that are exercised in actual governing practice. For example, it frequently overlooks spatial practices and strategies, such as ‘scale jumping, ‘rescaling’ and the discursive redrawing of governing boundaries. This book exposes some of these spatial power relationships, showing that the presence of such relationships has implications for accountability and effective policymaking. In sum, this book explores some of the ways in which we might better understand governance practice using theories of scale and relational concepts of power, and in the process it offers a critique and rethinking of governance theory. These reflections are made on the basis of an in-depth case study of the attempted pursuit of ‘good governance’ in the European Union via institutional reforms, focusing particularly on the thorny and fascinating case of North Sea fisheries management.

People can be excluded from freedom and the good things in life by age, disability, poverty, unfair discrimination, crime or the fear of crime, and arrogant and unresponsive governments. This practical reference deals with all of these factors, and shows the links between them. In addition to several hundred shorter notes it includes over a thousand major entries, each of which comprises: a summary of relevant facts, incisive commentary to help readers cut through the fog of jargon and propaganda that confuses many of these issues and websites where the latest information may be found. It concludes with a detailed bibliography of around 500 useful references. The work will be found useful by professionals and managers in all walks of life; by central and local government officials and representatives, and by students in the social sciences. It devotes particular attention to the all-important Disability Discrimination Act, and numerous detailed entries, accompanied in many cases by elegant diagrams, suggest to architects and other designers, facilities managers, and personnel managers how the requirements of the Act may be met.

This report finds that the Government's desire to deliver localism is neither supported consistently across Whitehall nor implemented coherently by each department of state. MPs warn that the Minister for Decentralisation will need to bring coherence, rigour and clear priorities to the Government's programme. The MPs call for a more explicit statement about where the dividing line will be drawn between a central, light-touch framework for local services and unwarranted interference from ministers in local affairs. So far the Government has shown itself all too eager to impose its preferences on local decision-making. Ministers have also introduced policies that circumvent rather than empower local government: elected police commissioners, free schools, academies and health service reform, threaten to fragment rather than integrate delivery of better public services at local level. As devolution proceeds, the manner in which local decisions are taken come under greater scrutiny. Any reduction in the inspection and performance management required by Whitehall must be accompanied by stronger local democratic accountability. Broadening the provider base for public services is an important plank of the government's decentralisation agenda, but it remains unclear how far the 'Big Society' can expand to take on services and functions shed by statutory bodies. Localism should not be adopted purely as a way to curb public sector costs not least because the financial benefits of more tailored services may not offset the loss of efficiencies of scale. Stimulating greater democratic participation and civic activism will itself cost money if it is to be successful and sustainable.

The twin processes of planning and property development are inextricably linked – it’s not possible to carry out a development strategy without an understanding of the planning process, and equally planners need to know how real estate developers do their job. This third edition of Urban Planning and Real Estate Development guides students through the procedural and practical aspects of developing land from the point of view of both planner and developer. The planning system is explained, from the increasing emphasis on spatial planning at a regional level down to the detailed perspective of the development control process and the specialist requirements of historic buildings and conservation areas. At the same time the authors explain the entire development process from inception through appraisal, valuation and financing to completion and disposal. This is an invaluable textbook for real estate and planning students, and helps to meet the requirements of the RICS and RTPI Assessment of Professional Competence.