Housing crisis: Gove to relax planning rules over mayor's 'failure'

The government has said it will make it easier to develop brownfield sites in the capital to remedy Sadiq Khan's "failure" to build enough homes.

A review has found the complexity of the London mayor's planning rules has been "frustrating" house-building.

Michael Gove has written to Mr Khan claiming "poor performance" in the capital warrants "critical" action.

City Hall said London had outpaced the rest of England, calling the report a "stunt" to distract from its record.

The review, held by an expert panel, found the mayor was falling well short of his target of 52,000 new homes every year over a decade.

"No-one disputes that London is experiencing a significant housing crisis," it explained.

"Over the long term, the supply of new homes has not kept pace with increases in jobs, population and housing demand.

"Four years into that 10-year period, when measured against the cumulative target, there has been an undersupply of more than 60,000 homes, more than a year of equivalent supply," the review said.

The study accepted house-building had been affected by wider economic conditions, new fire safety rules and the resourcing of local authority planning teams.

However, it found the complexity of the London Plan - which is the mayor's planning strategy for the capital - was impeding development.

"There is persuasive evidence that the combined effect of the multiplicity of policies in the London Plan now works to frustrate rather than facilitate the delivery of new homes, not least in creating very real challenges to the viability of schemes," it concluded.

Mr Gove, the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, has used the review as the basis for loosening planning rules to achieve an "overarching presumption in favour of housebuilding on brownfield land".

What this could mean is that local authorities will have less power to block new housing on former industrial and commercial sites.

In his letter to the mayor, Mr Gove said more than half of London councils were not building enough.

He said there had been a reduction in residential units being approved, from over 89,000 in 2018-19 to 68,000 in 2021-22 and 40,200 in 2022-23.

"The figures illustrate how critical it is that action is taken as soon as possible to address this," Mr Gove wrote.

He continued: "The report sets out significant issues - housing delivery in London has failed to meet the London Plan target and is well short of the assessed housing need."

However, City Hall said that nearly all recent housebuilding was on brownfield sites, and it was only government under-investment holding the capital back.

"This review is nothing more than a stunt from the government to distract from their abysmal record of failure," a spokesperson said.

"London under Sadiq Khan is outbuilding the rest of the country. Housing completions in the capital have hit the highest level since the 1930s, according to the government's own data.

"London is also delivering twice the level of council homebuilding as the rest of the country combined, showing up ministers' dismal failure nationally."

Having greater planning flexibility to bring more land into residential use is something that has been welcomed by some developers.

Mark Allan, chief executive officer of the property developer Landsec, said: "The emphasis on maximising housing development in urban areas set out today means that we can seize some of those opportunities, deliver more homes and secure better outcomes for cities and the people who live there."

However, architect George Clark told Today on BBC Radio 4 that brownfield development, including the cost of decontaminating land, was "notoriously difficult to do, and could lead to poor standards".

"There have been some awful examples of commercial office developments being turned into residential use," he said.

London Councils, the local government association for Greater London, says there is existing planning permission for about 140,000 homes that could be built if more government grants were available for developers.

Mr Khan announced last year he had met the target of starting 116,000 new affordable homes between 2015-16 and 2022-23, although a recent London Assembly report found affordable housebuilding had fallen off sharply.

A target of starting 35,000 affordable homes by 2026 - using £4bn from government - has been revised down to a minimum of 23,900.

Mr Gove has announced a consultation on whether the mayor is able to intervene on too many planning applications.

"I am aware of concerns from the sector that in some instances housebuilding is being delayed by unnecessary duplication of the planning process by the Greater London Authority," he said in his letter.

"Therefore, I am seeking views on whether changes are required to the threshold at which a residential planning application is referable to you as the mayor of London, which is currently set at 150 homes or more."

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