What the latest planning reforms mean for farms and rural areas

The government has been talking about the need to streamline the planning process since the last election, making it easier to release more land for housing and to obtain planning permission.

In 2020, it published its long-awaited Planning for the Future white paper which promised a major overhaul of the system to modernise the process.

See also: Practical tips on planning permission when diversifying land

Almost three years later, the debate about how best to update national planning policy rumbles on, with progress stalled by a revolving door of prime ministers and a backbench rebellion against some of the reforms included in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill.

In December 2022, the government published a consultation on reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) in a bid to drive things forward.

While there is a handful of elements within the NPPF consultation that lobby groups for farmers and landowners have welcomed, there is also concern that it contains proposals that would have a damaging effect on rural areas.

Proposed reforms that could affect the countryside include changing the methods used for calculating housing need, giving greater protection to greenbelt areas and placing a greater focus on “beauty” when it comes to development.

Housing need

One of the most hotly debated proposals is that local authorities should no longer be required to demonstrate a five-year housing land supply if they have an up-to-date local plan, but there is fear that this will undermine housing delivery in rural areas.

“A lot of rural housing is delivered outside of what has been adopted in the local plan by applying for a rural exception site,” says Avril Roberts, CLA property and business policy adviser.

“If you remove housing targets and also remove the ‘presumption in favour of sustainable development’ – which is how rural exception sites get approved – then you essentially remove the ability for sites that are not in the local plan to be brought forward.

“With a few exceptions, this means a site would have to be in the local plan to get permission, and we know that rural sites are much less likely to be allocated in local plans.”

Definition of beauty

Although the aspiration for beauty is a laudable objective, it raises questions because it is such a subjective term.

There are developments that farms might want to take forward such as solar parks, new sheds and slurry stores that would deliver environmental benefits, but might not necessarily be judged as “beautiful”.

The government has said each local authority would have codes, reflecting local design preferences.

If these are sufficiently detailed it could give farmers greater certainty about what a local authority might accept.

“But we just don’t know yet what will be defined as beautiful,” says Thomas Yule, NFU planning adviser.

“With the NPPF, a lot of the terms are also defined through appeals and legal cases, and these can take years to come through.”

Green belt

In addition, the government has proposed amending the NPPF to make it clear that local planning authorities “are not required to review and alter green belt boundaries if this would be the only way of meeting [housing] need in full”. 

This would be significant, as some local authorities have used the review process to reclassify parcels of green belt land to allow development on the edge of settlements where they have been struggling to meet their targets.

Mr Yule says such a change could largely close the door on farmers and landowners being able to sell off sites on the edge of built-up areas for housing.

It could also lead to a shortage of new housing in rural areas where brownfield sites for building projects are not widely available.

The government has committed to building 300,000 new homes overall every year by the mid-2020s. 

“The general consensus among developers, house builders and consultants is that we will not meet housing need by either brownfield or greenfield sites – we need a mix of both,” says Mr Yule.

The CLA says it is supportive of the principle of green belt policy, but argues it has become too restrictive and could lead to rural areas being left further behind economically.

“Green belt land is predominantly rural and much of the land is in agricultural use, but not all of any particular beauty or environmental value,” it says in its response to the consultation.

“Many businesses operate in the green belt and they need the ability to change and grow to remain competitive.

“Explicit guidance should be issued by the government to local authorities that a green belt designation is not a ban on all development in an area, but rather a check on urban sprawl and coalescence.”

However, the CLA highlights that the proposal to amend the definition of “affordable housing” in the NPPF to allow non-registered providers to deliver it would be a positive change.

It is pushing for a wider definition that could make it easier for farms and rural estates to build, manage and retain affordable housing.

Food production v development

There is a difference of opinion on what focus should be placed on food security considerations.

The NFU says while it strongly supports the proposed addition of a line in the NPPF highlighting the importance of land for food production, it is disappointed that this only features as a footnote, rather than being included more explicitly in the core text.

It estimates that by 2050, housing, employment, travel, communications and water infrastructure may require 170,000ha of agricultural land, with an additional 1.97m hectares required for energy production and nature-based recovery.

This means that development could potentially take up to 26%, or 2.1m hectares, of land from the current agricultural landscape, assuming that multifunctional land use is not possible. 

The NFU says this highlights the significant pressures agricultural land faces from competing uses and justifies why there should be more consideration to food production within the core text.

However, the CLA argues the best and most versatile farmland already has a high degree of protection, so it disagrees that there is a need for even further protection in the framework, fearing this would not be in the best interests of the rural economy and local communities.

“While food security is important, the best and most versatile land is already protected from development,” it says.

“Additionally, there are vast swathes of rural areas where most land has a land classification of Grade 1, 2 and 3a [best and most versatile] for agricultural value.

“If this land was given greater protection from development in the framework, there are rural areas that may never see any more development.”

The CLA argues that it is important that rural areas are not left behind, and some of the food production the government seeks to protect will depend on housing for staff as well as the availability of commercial premises for storage and processing.

It says both of these requirements could be jeopardised by the proposal.

Rural proofing

Where there is clear agreement among those looking at rural planning is that policy needs to address the particular challenges and opportunities facing the countryside more directly.

James Whilding, managing director of planning and design consultant Acorus Rural Property Services, says there is not enough specific guidance within the NPPF on how planning policy should be implemented in rural areas. 

“The focus is very much about the towns and cities and built-up settlements,” he says.

“But there needs to be a greater reflection on rural areas and the needs of rural people, and an acceptance that while there is this protectionist policy over the landscape, we also need to remember it is a living, working environment and we need to allow growth.”

Mr Whilding believes local authorities should be given more robust guidance on the need to be supportive of agricultural and rural diversification, given farmers are being forced to look for alternative sources of income as the BPS is phased out.

“There needs to be some blue-sky thinking from government and at local authority level to accept that the planning system has to be flexible and change as the farming industry does.” 

Shifting timetable

The government originally indicated that it would respond to the NPPF consultation this spring.

However, during a recent parliamentary committee hearing, housing minister Rachel Maclean revealed there was currently no timescale for its release.

There is also now talk of another NPPF consultation later this year.

Further delays are a worry, as many local councils are now pausing work on local plans – which are very time-consuming and expensive to produce – because they aren’t clear about what is happening at a national level.

The planning policy landscape is further clouded by the prospect of a general election by the end of January 2025.

It means any farmers thinking about seeking planning permission are working in a very confusing policy environment.

However, Miss Roberts is hoping the next NPPF consultation could bring some much-needed improvements.

The first consultation was clearly influenced by the need to placate those backbench Tory MPs who had objected so strongly to the ideas in the Levelling-Up Bill, because of pressure from their constituents.

However, there has been a strong pushback from developers, local authorities and planning experts, who have warned that the changes could make the undersupply of housing even worse and lead to greater uncertainty.

“If some of these current proposals happened, they could be devastating for rural areas, but I don’t think there is enough support for them to be adopted,” says Miss Roberts.

“I’m really intrigued to see what will be in the next consultation on the NPPF. My hunch is it could be a bit more positive than this one, because this one was reactionary.”

For now, rural leaders and planning consultants will continue to lobby for amendments.

Despite three years of debate, it is clear there is still a way to go before the planning regime is fit for purpose for farmers and landowners.