After 11 months of debate the Localism Act is here. The legislation aims to pass power down from central government to local councils and beyond. Here at DPP we see this as just the beginning of the changes to come with a whole raft of secondary legislation and transitional arrangements still to be published.

Comments are being sought from The Department of the Environment (DOE) on new proposals for consolidating and amending the Planning (Environmental Impact Assessment)...

Comments are being sought from the DCLG in relation to 2 issues ahead of a formal consultation in the autumn; namely the Planning Guarantee and Information Requirements. There is a real opportunity at this stage to influence the content of the consultation paper....

Demolition is now considered ‘development’ and will be a material consideration for all planning applications and no longer just a process of implementing development. A Court of Appeal ruling means all buildings will now require planning permission or prior approval for demolition. The days of simply sending in the bulldozer are over. Please click on the link below which will take you to our briefing note on the new demolition rules and what they will mean to you....

The 10-year review of the Regional Development Strategy (RDS), the Government’s overarching spatial plan for Northern Ireland, was issued last week by...

After numerous false dawns, the Localism Bill was finally published on 13th December 2010. At 406 pages (over two volumes) it is clearly a massive piece of legislation covering not only planning but also the conduct of councillors, social housing and a range of other matters.

It comes at a time when the tourism industry is starting to feel the squeeze but the timely launch of this new tourism policy document provide the ideal opportunity to address some of the challenges facing the industry.

Major changes to the NI planning system were announced by Environment Minister Edwin Poots today that will see Planning Service dissolved and its replacement (a central DOE body based on the geographical locations of the proposed 11 super-councils) put in place by 1 April 2011.

The long awaited revised PPS4 was published on Tuesday by the Planning Service, almost eight years after the publication of the draft.

The Government has set out a number of mechanisms to incentivise small and medium scale energy generation in Great Britain. FITs were introduced in April 2010 to incentivise renewable electricity generation schemes of up to five megawatts (MW). Eligible technologies include solar photovoltaic (PV), anaerobic digestion, hydroelectric, micro combined heat and power and wind.

In a new consultation document issued this week, the Planning Service has proposed changes to the structure and level of planning application fees...

In Building a Greener Future - Policy Statement (July 2007), the Government set the target for new homes at net zero carbon from 2016. To achieve this, energy efficiency standards for new homes are to be improved by 25 per cent in 2010 and a further 44 per cent in 2013 relative to current 2006 standards. These changes are to be implemented through the Building Regulations as part of their 3 yearly review.

The long awaited final version of PPS21 was published on 1st June 2010. This concluded the process to reform rural planning policy in Northern Ireland,which started over four years ago with the publication of draft PPS14 on 4th March 2006. Omagh District....

With the first coalition Government for 70 years there has been considerable discussion on how the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties may resolve differences over electoral reform, nuclear power and taxation reform but less is known on how they may work together in the fields of planning and development. Click on the link below to view our briefing which gives some insight on what we can expect.

PPS5: Planning for the historic environment, was published on 23rd March 2010, replacing PPG15 (Planning and the historic environment), 1994 and PPG16 (Archaeology and planning), 1990. The PPS is accompanied by....

The much trailed Conservative Green Paper on planning is with us at last. The new approach is badged as ‘open source’ planning...

In response to recent political pressure to address so-called ‘garden grabbing’, the Planning Service recently published its second Addendum to PPS 7: Safeguarding the Character of Established Residential Areas in draft. The consultation period ends on 5th March 2010....

PPS4 is finally here. It has been one year and five months in production, went through two separate consultation exercises and has swept up four-and-a-bit other planning policy statements along the way. PPS4: Planning for Sustainable Economic Growth eventually emerged from the Whitehall bunkers in that limbo period of the year, 29th December, thus (just) fulfilling the Government’s promise to publish by the end of 2009.

On 1st October 2009 some significant changes to planning legislation will come into force in England. These changes are designed to help kick-start the the more frustrating aspects of the planning system.