Offices to Houses without the need for Planning Permission

Mike Gibson, Connectivity Associates Ltd and Vice Chair of the Chamber's Property & Construction Committee

The government has announced new ‘permitted development rights’ that will allow offices to be converted into houses and flats without the need for planning permission. However, this is to last only for a limited period of three years.

Mike Gibson, Chair of the Chamber’s Property and Construction Committee, said: "The aim of this new measure is to encourage the re-use of vacant office floorspace and to increase the supply of much-needed new housing, whilst ensuring that the most effective use is made of previously-developed land.

"Local authorities will be able to seek a local exemption where this can be justified on economic grounds, although Communities Secretary, Eric Pickles, has said that such an exemption will only be granted in exceptional circumstances.

"When this was proposed some time ago, it applied to all types of business and industrial premises and came in for criticism from both the public and the private sectors. Now that it applies only to offices it will gain wider support. Certainly, this further reduction in bureaucracy, which will remove the need for potentially costly and time-consuming planning applications, is to be welcomed.

"However, it remains to be seen if it will fulfil government claims that it will make a valuable contribution to easing the national housing shortage, boost job-creation in the construction industry and help town centre regeneration. That’s quite a lot relying on a permitted development right."