The National Planning Policy Framework 2012 sets out the Government's planning policies for England in achieving sustainable development and how these are expected to be applied. It sets out the requirements for the planning system only to the extent that it is relevant, proportionate and necessary to do so. It provides a framework within which local people and their accountable councils can produce their own distinctive local and neighbourhood plans, which reflect the needs and priorities of their communities. This Framework does not contain specific policies for nationally significant projects for which particular considerations apply. Divided into thirteen chapters, with three annexes, it looks at the following areas, including: building a competitive economy; ensuring town centre vitality; supporting a high quality communications infrastructure; delivering high quality homes; protecting the Green Belt; meeting the challenges of climate change, flooding and coastal change; conserving the natural and historic environments and facilitating the sustainable use of minerals.

Interpreting the NPPF: the New National Planning Policy Framework aims to explain the revised NPPF to planners, developers and legal advisers throughout England. The book seeks to summarise the most important case law interpreting the previous NPPF, so far as is relevant to the new version. It provides an explanation of the legal status and nature of national planning policy law, as well as consideration of how the new NPPF should be interpreted. --from back cover.

This report recommends that a default answer of 'yes' to development should be removed from the National Planning Policy Framework (NPFF). The phrase 'significantly and demonstrably' must also be removed from the presumption that all planning applications should be approved unless the adverse effects 'significantly and demonstrably' outweigh the benefits, because it adds a further barrier to the achievement of truly sustainable development. The definition of 'sustainable development' is inadequate and often conflated with 'sustainable economic growth'. The framework gives the impression that greater emphasis should be given in planning decisions to economic growth, undermining the equally important environmental and social elements of the planning system. The NPPF should require local planning decisions to be taken in accordance with the presumption in favour of sustainable development consistent with Local Plans. It is unacceptable that so many parts of England have yet to develop and adopt a new Local Plan. Clarity within the NPPF has suffered in the pursuit of brevity. Inconsistent drafting could create gaps in planning policy or guidance that could lead to a huge expansion in the size of Local Plans - as local authorities attempt to plug those gaps. The test for 'viability', as currently worded, risks allowing unsustainable developments to go ahead if measures to make them sustainable are deemed to make them unviable for the developer. MPs also call for a sensible transition period to give local authorities time to put Local Plans in place where they have not already done so.

The Committee invited submissions on how the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) has worked in practice since it came into operation in April 2012. The evidence to this inquiry has highlighted a number of emerging concerns: that the NPPF is not preventing unsustainable development in some places; that inappropriate housing is being imposed upon some communities as a result of speculative planning applications; and that town centres are being given insufficient protection against the threat of out of town development. These issues do not, however, point to the need to tear up or withdrawn the NPPF; rather they suggest a need to reinforce its provisions and ensure it does the job it was intended to do.

Sustainable development in the National Planning Policy Framework : Oral and written evidence, Wednesday 12 October 2011, Neil Sinden, Campaign to Protect Rural England, Peter Nixon, National Trust, Dr Hugh Ellis, Town and Country Planning Association, Na

Spatial planning, strongly advocated by government and the profession, is intended to be more holistic, more strategic, more inclusive, more integrative and more attuned to sustainable development than previous approaches. In what the authors refer to as the New Spatial Planning, there is a fairly rapidly evolving maturity and sophistication in how strategies are developed and produced. Crucially, the authors argue that the reworked boundaries of spatial planning means that to understand it we need to look as much outside the formal system of practices of ‘planning’ as within it. Using a rich empirical resource base, this book takes a critical look at recent practices to see whether the new spatial planning is having the kinds of impacts its advocates would wish. Contributing to theoretical debates in planning, state restructuring and governance, it also outlines and critiques the contemporary practice of spatial planning. This book will have a place on the shelves of researchers and students interested in urban/regional studies, politics and planning studies.

This supporting document to Budget 2011 (HC 836, ISBN 9780102971033) sets out the Government's plan for sustainable, long-term economic growth for the UK economy. It sets out four ambitions that underpin this objective, these are: to create the most competitive tax system in the G20; to make the UK one of the best places in Europe to start, finance and grow a business; to encourage investment and exports as a route to a more balanced economy and to create a more educated workforce that is the most flexible in Europe. Growth review measures outlined in Chapter 2 cover these priority areas: planning; regulation; trade and inward investment; access to finance; competition; corporate governance; low carbon. The first phase of the review also examined eight sectors of the economy to remove the barriers to growth that affect them: advanced manufacturing; healthcare and life sciences; digital and creative industries; professional and business services; retail; construction; space; tourism.