Andy Burnham "did not ask" for powers to overturn council decisions

Andy Burnham will have the power to overturn decisions by local councils over controversial developments under new proposals.

The Greater Manchester mayor says he did not ask for these new powers and, privately, council sources doubt that he will use them. However, the government has now confirmed that it plans to empower all mayors across England to ‘call in’ planning applications.

It comes after changes to the planning system were unveiled, sparking fears that local councillors will have less of a say over what gets built. Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner has vowed that the reforms will not remove local democratic power from councils.

But under the new English Devolution White Paper which she unveiled on Monday (16 December), decisions by local planning committees could be overturned by the mayor if he disagrees with them.

The planning reforms announced earlier in December also give planning officers the power to bypass local councillors and approve plans that comply with locally-agreed development plans.

The government says that this will tackle ‘chronic uncertainty, unacceptable delays and unnecessary waste of time and resources’. Ultimately, the government hopes these changes will speed up the planning process and help build the 1.5m homes Labour promised.

In an effort to meet those targets, the government has also introduced new local targets for housebuilding which some critics warn could mean more green belt land will have to be built on. However, the new targets will not apply to most of Greater Manchester.

That’s because nine of the 10 councils in the city-region have signed up to a joint plan which sets out where 165,000 new homes will be built across Greater Manchester over the next 15 years. The Places for Everyone plan, which replaced the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework when Stockport pulled out in late 2020, was formally approved this year, but now faces a High Court challenge.

Speaking to the Manchester Evening News after the planning reforms were announced earlier this month, Mr Burnham said that Greater Manchester is in a ‘stronger position’ than other areas because of the plan which means that the government is less likely to intervene on local planning decisions. But asked if he wants the power to ‘call-in’ planning applications himself, he was not so keen.

The Labour mayor said that he would rather see the government step in faster than ‘sitting in judgement on the councils’ himself. A few days after he made these comments, the government confirmed that mayors would get the ‘call-in’ powers that he did not want.

Responding to the announcement, Mr Burnham said: “It’s one that we need to really work through together, myself and the 10 leaders, because we kind of work as one on planning. It’s not quite the London model. But what this could do is speed things up.

“But it’s a case of speeding things up without losing a democratic oversight and the ability for our residents to have their voices heard.

"The call-in process doesn’t really help anybody because it causes often a really long delay because decisions can come back out so I think there’s a real benefit for Greater Manchester but it’s a way that makes it work for us as well.”

Senior Labour sources in Greater Manchester have told the M.E.N. that they doubt Mr Burnham will use his new powers to ‘call-in’ planning applications. But councillors from other parties in the city-region have raised concerns about the planning reforms in general.

Marc Hince, an independent councillor who chairs Oldham’s planning committee, said: “It’s a worry. I’m always concerned when central government takes away powers from local authorities.

“Our ethos as independents is we want it to go the other way. We want to see more powers devolved to local communities.

“We want to see more power handed to residents and stakeholders, rather than central government, who in my view set the needs and and wants of property developers and housebuilders first to meet targets.”

He added: “It’s frustrating. We’re entering into an area of unknown.

“The people who will really suffer will obviously be residents themselves. [Places for Everyone] in my view took away the local communities’ ability to determine [which areas need to be protected] and now it seems the government have taken away local authorities’ ability to determine such things.

“It’s a bit Stalinist in my view.”

Labour councillor Elaine Taylor, who is the deputy leader at Oldham council, has confirmed that the planning reforms will not affect the borough for the time being. But she said that the local authority will have to review the implications of the targets in the long-run.

She said: “There’s no getting away from the fact that we’re in a housing crisis. We’re feeling it acutely here in Oldham at the minute and every Council in the country has a responsibility to build more homes for our residents.

“The higher housebuilding figures confirm what the government consulted on, but changes to the NPPF won’t kick in for Oldham for another 4 years. Places for Everyone, which sets out our housebuilding strategy, puts us in a strong position to provide adequate time to review the implications and plan ahead.”

In Labour-run Trafford, opposition councillors are also concerned about the changes. Altrincham’s Green councillor Dan Jerrome fears that the government is trying to get around the local planning process while allowing private developers to ‘maximise their profits’.

He said: “Communities will find they don’t get their voice heard and local democracy will suffer. Plans like Timperley Wedge and Carrington Moss will not get the scrutiny they need and that would be terrible.”

Trafford’s Tory opposition leader Nathan Evans added: “The planning reforms increase targets, but they don’t really give us a mechanism for delivering those targets. They also say they are increasing the number of planning officers by 300 across the country. That’s half a planning officer per council.”

Labour councillor Liz Patel, who is the Executive Member for Economy and Regeneration at Trafford council, said: “Every borough across the country – including Trafford – faces a housing shortage so we are highly supportive of the Government’s plans to accelerate the delivery of more homes. The plan, in fact, reflects our own corporate priority for a thriving economy and providing homes for all. We are currently reviewing the Government’s plan to properly understand what it means for the borough of Trafford.”

What the planning reforms mean for Stockport is less clear. The council, which is now controlled by the Lib Dems, pulled out of Greater Manchester’s joint development plan at the eleventh hour in 2020, deciding to go it alone and create its own local plan.

The local authority’s draft plan was delayed in August when Labour announced plans for new housebuilding targets. The local plan aims to build 15,000 homes in the borough over the next 15 years, with 8,000 of these based in the town centre.

But the new housebuilding targets could mean the council needs to build nearly 2,000 homes a year, up from the 1,000 currently being planned. Last month, the council launched a review of its green belt insisting that it will still take a ‘brownfield-first’ approach.

Lib Dem councillor Mark Roberts, who is cabinet Member with responsibility for delivering Stockport’s Local Plan, said that the council is in the process of making sure the policies in the previous draft are compliant with the new planning rules.

However, he said that local authority will still have to identify sites needed to meet the government’s new compulsory housing targets in the new year.

Under the new devolution proposals, mayors would also have the power to introduce joint development plans like Places for Everyone without unanimous agreement from all the councils.

If this had been in place sooner, the decade-long saga over the controversial spatial framework could have been avoided and the plan could have been approved even if some councils opposed it.

But asked whether the new ‘simply majority’ rule could affect Stockport’s plan, Mr Burnham said we are now ‘past that point’.

He said: “I think as far as Places for Everyone is concerned, we’ve gone past that point with Stockport.

"And with the call-in power, I just think we need a regime that works for everybody that everyone is comfortable with in Greater Manchester whilst taking the benefit of quicker decision-making – decision-making that’s closer to Greater Manchester – and also understanding what how we empower our residents and their voice within it.”

Joseph Timan, Charlotte Hall, Declan Carey, and Nick Jackson, Local Democracy Reporters