Letters

Email to Kate Green MP sent a few days ago – re Universal Basic Income (UBI) on discovering that she does not support the idea – which of course she is perfectly allowed to do (or not do – if that is better grammatically?)

Thank you for your response to my earlier email.

Yes, I’m afraid we will have to agree to disagree about UBI, but what really upsets me is that, if this represents official Labour Party Newspeak for avoiding having a vision for a better society, then the party is dead in the water.  What you appear to be saying, and forgive me if I am getting it wrong, is that the Labour Party believe that the Universal Credit system, which is all we have at the moment, is to be preferred to UBI, because it “addresses the problems of economic and social inequality”.  I haven’t seen the Party come up with any viable alternative to Universal Credit, so I’m assuming that is the implication of what you are saying.  As we all know, Universal Credit is designed to shame the underprivileged and forgotten in society to seek out jobs that are basically not there, and will be even less there (if that makes sense) after the full effects of the pandemic are known.  We are already hearing of massive redundancies and we know that more jobs will be lost at the end of furlough.  The only jobs actually being created would appear to be in the gig economy for self-employed persons, which we all know really means large amounts of exploitation and lack of job and income security.  We already have the basis for a UBI in the OAP and Child Benefit systems, and I cannot believe that UBI would not be the best, fairest way to address economic and social equality amongst the rest of society, without resorting to a dehumanising benefits system.  This is especially the case, given the massive costs and bureaucracy of the Universal Credit system.

Whilst Keir Starmer is clearly wiping the floor with Boris, which is great to see, the lost labour voters from the last election are going to need more than a rather confused solution to the Anti-semitism issue, and the ritual ex-communication of Corbyn to win them back.  They need a vision for a better society that will have the robustness to meet all future disasters (pandemic spikes, Post-Brexit economic decline, high structural unemployment, lack of job security, low wages for part-time and zero-hours workers etc etc) and only a version of UBI will help to achieve this.

What really upset me, however, was that your response almost exactly mirrored the argument put forward by our beloved Sean Anstee in the early years of Austerity, when he claimed that his choice not to increase Council Tax by the allowed maximum of 2% was in order to protect the financially worst off.  As a result, he took a government bribe for a few years and left the Council with a baseline council tax revenue over £10 million per annum less than it would now have been.  And I don’t see that helping address economic or social inequality in the long term. 

I don’t make a habit normally of using biblical quotes in political debate, but in this one case I think I need to make an exception.  It says at one point that “without a vision, the people perish”.  There are a lot of people who pin all their hopes on the Labour Party at this time – understandably so.  But I see no evidence of a vision and I am fearful that the people will perish on the altar of a Party trying hard not to rock the boat too much and whose vision does not seem to extend much further than being just a little bit nicer than the Tories.

And there I suppose we will have to agree to disagree again?

John Westbrook

Since writing this, Kate Green has come back to me with a link to a statement by Jonathan Reynolds, (Labour’s work and pensions spokesperson), who promised on 30th July that “there will be no return” by him to the ‘undeserving poor’ rhetoric used by George Osborne when talking about the social security system. The full statement is available on the Labourlist.org web page. Maybe there is hope?

Letter to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) on 30th July regarding the current proposal to create new Permitted Development Rights to allow developers demolish vacant buildings and rebuild with housing on the site. Not in itself a bad idea, but with some worrying omissions.

Dear sir/madam

Re: Proposed changes to Permitted Development Rights

I am writing in response to the recent report into “the quality standard of homes delivered through change of use permitted development rights”.  I am a chartered town planner, and from my own personal experience of conversion schemes from office to residential using PD rights, it is absolutely clear that use of those rights is currently resulting in large numbers of sub-standard housing units that do little or nothing to meet the actual needs of the population.  The results of the report support my experience on this matter.  The key issues are the inability of local authorities to exercise any control over compliance with National Space Standards (thus resulting in miniscule and inadequate units) or to ensure that such conversion schemes contain an affordable element.

I note that your response to the report includes the following statements:

“This independent research shows on average there was little difference in the appearance, energy performance or access to services between schemes delivered through permitted development and those that were granted full planning permission.” and

“All developers should meet the highest possible design standards and the changes we are making will continue to improve the quality of these homes, including new requirements for natural light and checks to ensure changes are in keeping with the character of their local area.”

It may well be that on matters of appearance, energy performance or access to services there is little difference to schemes that have received explicit permission.  However, this does not cover the issues of substandard space or affordability, and there would not appear to be any reference to these issues in your response.  I would like to see such an explicit response please.

Moreover, whilst I accept that all developers “should” meet the highest possible standards it is clear that in practice they don’t, at least in terms of space, and that they won’t do so unless the PD rights are amended to make it compulsory for new housing units created to meet Nationally Described Space Standards.  Similarly, the PD rights should include a definitive responsibility to provide a proportion of affordable units.

In the light of past experience with office to residential conversions, I am greatly concerned that the proposed new PD rights relating to demolition and rebuilding also have no requirements with regard to meeting space standards and provision of affordable units.  Without such requirements, your statement that you will continue to improve the quality of homes is completely hollow and meaningless, and instead leads to the somewhat inevitable conclusion that you, in practice, condone a decline in quality by having no apparent interest in these matters.

I am asking that you amend the PD rights – both existing and proposed – to include measures to deal with these issues and ensure that decent homes with adequate space at a reasonable price is the result.  If not, they would clearly remain little more than a developers’ charter to provide substandard housing that is of no use to families or others in desperate need of an affordable home.

If you do not intend to make such amendments, could you provide me with your official explanation as to why residential developments created using the PD rights do not have meet the same criteria as those that go through the normal development management procedures – to which Nationally Described Space Standards and affordable housing requirements are expected to apply, and for a very good reason.

Yours,

John Westbrook

First four pages of my response to the Government’s new White Paper ‘Planning for the Future’ – Published last month. after a lifetime working as a planner, this is the worst and most dangerous set of proposals it is my misfortune to have had to plough through. I have been through all 70+ pages and will provide a link to all my comments when I have checked them to remove expletives and modified to minimise risk of libel. I’ll then send the whole lot off to the government as my comments. Seriously, this is one awful set of proposals that include many veiled threats to our local democracy. This is just extracts from the forewords by Boris and Robert Jenryck (Secretary of State), along with my observations (in italics). It gets even worse after this.

WHITE PAPER – ‘Planning for the Future’

Foreword by Boris Johnson

‘I never cease to be amazed by the incredible potential of this country. The vast array of innovations and talent that, when combined with our extraordinary can-do spirit, has brought forth everything from the jet engine to gene editing therapy.’

Perhaps a pity that out of all the truly great innovations that he could have picked, he chose one of the most polluting inventions, and one which, given his chief advisor Dominic Cummings past flirtations with Eugenics, might provoke mixed reactions.  It seems to indicate that the Prime Minister understands nothing about Climate Change, Sustainability or Sensitivity.  Not a good start.

‘But as we approach the second decade of the 21st century that potential is being artificially constrained by a relic from the middle of the 20th – our outdated and ineffective planning system.’

For ‘outdated’, read ‘has stood the test of time’ and for ‘ineffective’ read ‘a necessary check on antisocial and unsustainable developments’.  Unfortunately, this reads as so much unsubstantiated personal dogma.  Not progressing too well so far.

‘Designed and built in 1947 it has, like any building of that age, been patched up here and there over the decades.’    Yes.  And still works.

‘Extensions have been added on, knocked down and rebuilt according to the whims of whoever’s name is on the deeds at the time. Eight years ago a new landlord stripped most of the asbestos from the roof.’

The Prime Minister can’t help himself can he?  He can only communicate by using rather pointless and childish analogies.  In this case, it has to be assumed that the event eight years ago that he is referring to is the 2012 introduction of the National Planning Policy Framework by his own government.  This sweeping generalisation of a document must be the ‘stripping’ that he refers to, in which case the planning system would presumably have been better off without such intervention!  This doesn’t bode well for the rest of the document to follow.

‘But make-do-and-mend can only last for so long and, in 2020, it is no longer fit for human habitation.’

Still waiting for him to progress beyond meaningless and inaccurate analogies.

‘Thanks to our planning system, we have nowhere near enough homes in the right places. People cannot afford to move to where their talents can be matched with opportunity. Businesses cannot afford to grow and create jobs. The whole thing is beginning to crumble and the time has come to do what too many have for too long lacked the courage to do – tear it down and start again.’

Perhaps a confusion here between being courageous and being doctrinaire.  There is no evidence other than the Prime Minister’s own bluster that the problem he refers to is the fault of the planning system.  I could just as easily point to problems with land values, land hoarding, excess profiteering,  and a lack of effective government support, etc and I suspect I would have more people who are knowledgeable in such matters on my side than the PM has on his.

‘That is what this paper proposes. Radical reform unlike anything we have seen since the Second World War.  Not more fiddling around the edges, not simply painting over the damp patches, but levelling the foundations and building, from the ground up, a new planning system for England.’

But it needs to be better than the one it replaces.  Radical reform does not necessarily mean better and could quite conceivably, given the personnel involved in this venture, be catastrophic for the majority of the population.

‘One that is simpler, clearer and quicker to navigate, delivering results in weeks and months rather than years and decades.’ 

Perhaps the PM should refer to figures here about the high percentages of planning applications being decided within statutory time limits of 8 or 13 weeks.  He seems very good at cherry-picking selected info and/or making things up?

‘That encourages sustainable, beautiful, safe and useful development rather than obstructing it.’

Absolutely.  Unfortunately, there is little evidence that developers put such grand aspirations above profit.  The existing planning system is actually very good at encouraging better proposals than the ones commonly presented by developers at their first attempt.

‘That makes it harder for developers to dodge their obligations to improve infrastructure and opens up housebuilding to more than just the current handful of massive corporations.’

This I agree with.

‘That gives you a greater say over what gets built in your community.’

Again, community involvement at all stages over all aspects of development is paramount.  The current system is perfectly capable of delivering this.

‘That makes sure start-ups have a place to put down roots and that businesses great and small have the space they need to grow and create jobs.’

Yep.  The current system can and does do this.  Where is the evidence that it doesn’t?

‘And, above all, that gives the people of this country the homes we need in the places we want to live at prices we can afford, so that all of us are free to live where we can connect our talents with opportunity.’

Sorry, but yet again, it is not the planning system that prevents this happening.

‘Getting homes built is always a controversial business. Any planning application, however modest, almost inevitably attracts objections and I am sure there will be those who say this paper represents too much change too fast, too much of a break from what has gone before.’

Yes.  But I don’t see any evidence from the past performance of the PM that he cares one jot about what other people think.  So presumably, nyah, nyah (or Greek equivalent) to them

‘But what we have now simply does not work.’

Wrong.  Doctrinaire PM bluster again.  Just repeating unsubstantiated statements over and over again does not make them right.

‘So let’s do better. Let’s make the system work for all of us. And let’s take big, bold steps so that we in this country can finally build the homes we all need and the future we all want to see. ‘

Yes. Let’s. But this isn’t the right approach.  What an appalling foreword.

Foreword by SoS

‘The outbreak of COVID-19 has affected the economic and social lives of the entire nation. With so many people spending more time at home than ever before, we have come to know our homes, gardens and local parks more intimately.’

Yes.  And we’ve also come to realise that many of us can work from home and miss the daily stressful commute.  This points to a whole new set of planning issues for the future and should be acknowledged as such.

‘For some this has been a welcome opportunity to spend more time in the place they call home with the people they love. For others – those in small, substandard homes, those unable to walk to distant shops or parks, those struggling to pay their rent, or indeed for those who do not have a home of their own at all – ‘

Absolutely, and none of this is the fault of the planning system.

‘this has been a moment where longstanding issues in our development and planning system have come to the fore.’

And also, and more pointedly, those systems relating to equality, sustainability, legal and human rights, wealth and power structures, financial and job insecurity.  These need sorting out first.

‘Such times require decisive action and a plan for a better future. These proposals will help us to build the homes our country needs, bridge the present generational divide and recreate an ownership society in which more people have the security and dignity of a home of their own.’

Absolutely, and changing the planning system comes a long, long way down the list of fundamental things wrong about the way the financial and property sectors of the country operate.  It’s a pity the government has its priorities wrong.

‘Our proposals seek a significantly simpler, faster and more predictable system. They aim to facilitate a more diverse and competitive housing industry, in which smaller builders can thrive alongside the big players, where all pay a fair share of the costs of infrastructure and the affordable housing existing communities require and where permissions are more swiftly turned into homes.’

This might sound more believable if it did not come from a SoS whom the Appeal Court has stated showed apparent bias in favour of a ‘large’ developer, and who has subsequently been shown by documentation to have actively intervened in favour of that ‘large’ developer at a critical time in the development process.  His only regret appears to have been where he sat at a table at a special dinner.  For him now to attempt to indicate some form of interest in the small developer is somewhat unsavoury.  To make such statements as we see in here in his foreword relies on having respect, and I’m afraid he does not appear to have that. From my own independent research, few people would appear to believe he would have been so directly supportive to a small-scale developer.

‘We are cutting red tape, but not standards.’

I suspect this may actually be untrue.  Recent changes to permitted development rights have allowed conversions from commercial to residential uses with no requirement to meet the government’s own Nationally Described Space Standards.  So to say that the government is not cutting standards might be interpreted by right thinking people as something of an untruth?

‘This Government doesn’t want to just build houses. We want a society that has re-established powerful links between identity and place, between our unmatchable architectural heritage and the future, between community and purpose. Our reformed system places a higher regard on quality, design and local vernacular than ever before, and draws inspiration from the idea of design codes and pattern books that built Bath, Belgravia and Bournville. Our guiding principle will be as Clough Williams-Ellis said to cherish the past, adorn the present and build for the future.’

Bath and Belgravia are examples of development for the elite that could never be afforded by the ordinary person.  We don’t need more of these.  Bourneville was a philanthropic venture that was not designed to make any significant profit.  Whilst Bourneville might have some link to an appropriate current aspiration, examples of ‘quality’ developments that were only ever intended for the elite just shows how out of touch this government is with the actual needs of our communities today.  Shame on you.  This is appalling.

‘We will build environmentally friendly homes that will not need to be expensively retrofitted in the future, homes with green spaces and new parks at close hand, where tree lined streets are the norm and where neighbours are not strangers.’

Fine.  I like this, but there is no evidence that most modern developers share this vision.  Certainly the current planning system would encourage and support this – and would be able to help deliver it.

‘We are moving away from notices on lampposts to an interactive and accessible map-based online system – placing planning at the fingertips of people. The planning process will be brought into the 21st century. Communities will be reconnected to a planning process that is supposed to serve them, with residents more engaged over what happens in their areas.’

Absolutely.  It is happening now under the current system.  And don’t forget, that many people who are not IT literate rely on notices on lampposts.  Or maybe these people don’t matter?  This is a somewhat arrogant interpretation of society that smacks of privilege and not of meeting the real needs of the population.  Only to be expected I suppose.  It’s always our fault isn’t it.

‘While the current system excludes residents who don’t have the time to contribute to the lengthy and complex planning process, local democracy and accountability will now be enhanced by technology and transparency.’

Total b******t.  Pardon my French.  Yes, transparency is needed, but it is not the current system that is holding it back, and technology will not, of itself, deliver it.  The current system, including lampposts, excludes no-one other than those who show no interest.  That is a matter for political education not technology.  Any plans for that?

‘Reforming the planning system isn’t a task we undertake lightly, but it is both an overdue and a timely reform. Millions of jobs depend on the construction sector and in every economic recovery, it has played a crucial role.’

Yes.  But what is built is critical – not just building for its own sake.  And there is no indication that the proposed system will result in the construction of what is actually needed. 

‘This paper sets out how we will reform the planning system to realise that vision and make it more efficient, effective and equitable.’

No it doesn’t.  Its just a doctrinaire reform that has nothing to do with effectiveness or equity.  Every system has the potential to be more efficient without necessarily destroying it completely.