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Planning reform vote pulled amid threat of rebellion over housing targets
A key vote on planning reforms set for next week has been pulled amid the threat of a backbench rebellion over local housing targets.
Scheduled for Monday, the vote on the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill will now no longer go ahead, with the delay blamed officially on busy parliamentary schedules.
It comes amid rebellion from a growing number of Conservative backbenchers who have ambushed the new legislation with changes that would tear up existing rules on housing targets.
Some 50 MPs signed a set of amendments to the bill, tabled by Chipping Barnet MP Theresa Villiers, that would scrap mandatory local housing targets set by Westminster and make them advisory instead.
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The amendments would also abolish a requirement on councils to identify a five-year stock of land for future development and end the current system’s “presumption in favour of development”.
Signed by senior Conservatives, including Iain Duncan Smith, Damian Green and Chris Grayling, the rebellion
has reopened debate over government-set housing targets – an issue that featured heavily in Conservative leadership debates.
The changes put forward by Ms Villiers have been criticised by housing campaigners and other Conservative MPs, who said the amendments would hold back housebuilding.
On Twitter, former housing secretary Simon Clarke called the proposed changes “wrong” and “economically and socially disastrous”.
He added: “I understand totally how inappropriate development has poisoned the debate on new homes in constituencies like Chipping Barnet, but I do not believe the abandonment of all housing targets is the right response.”
The bill will introduce a number changes to the planning system, including an Infrastructure Levy to replace Section 106 and a community land auction pilot.
It has already been significantly watered down since its inception in the 2020 Planning White Paper, due to a previous row with Conservative backbenchers about local communities’ control over development.
