The UK Government’s Planning Bill proposes a new Infrastructure Planning Committee (IPC) which will be responsible for decisions on big infrastructure projects such as nuclear power stations, new airport terminals and large wind energy projects.
The aim of the Planning Bill and this new IPC Committee is to speed up planning decisions, however it is obvious that lumping large wind energy projects, nuclear power stations and airports under the same system is going to bring trouble, particularly as there is no way that the UK government will get away with not giving the general public their human rights to speak at a public hearing.
Despite the IPC making the final decision on these large projects, Local Planning Authorities will be invited to produce a report on the likely impact of the infrastructure project proposed on their local area. The IPC will decide how long they have to do this. The key difference between the new IPC system and the existing system was going to be the introduction of definitive timescales in the process – however even this now appears to have become rather hazy. The Lord Chancellor is keen to ensure “that the IPC should give councils the longest time possible to complete impact reports”.
So now we have something that looks uncannily like the old system – having spent much public money which could have been spent on extra resource improving the efficiency of the existing system. They have also managed to avoid any difficult decisions on the majority of wind energy projects as most being under 50MW will still fall under the standard Town and Country Planning Act route with decisions being made by local officials usually heavily lobbied by nimbys. At least the lawyers can rub their hands together with glee – however these decisions are made.
