2 What are Regional Spatial Strategies?
Definition of Regional Spatial
Strategies (RSSs)
4. Regional Spatial Strategies were introduced in
place of county-level structure plans in the Planning and Compulsory
Purchase Act 2004. National Planning Policy Guidance (PPG) was
replaced by Planning Policy Statements (PPS), and local plans
were replaced by Local Development Frameworks (LDFs)—a collection
of local development documents, written by each District Council
and having regard to the RSS in their particular region. Each
RSS became the strategic level plan for a region in England—a
statutory, legal document—charged with informing every Local
Development Framework (LDF) within that region.
5. Paragraph 1.3 of Planning Policy Statement 11
describes the wide range of planning topics that RSSs should cover:
The following matters should be taken into account:
identification of the scale and distribution of provision for
new housing; priorities for the environment, such as countryside
and biodiversity protection; and transport, infrastructure, economic
development, agriculture, minerals extraction and waste treatment
and disposal.[3]
6. Written evidence from the Department of Communities
and Local Government (DCLG) summarised the reasoning behind the
creation of RSSs in 2004:
The rationale for a regional planning tier was the
need to coordinate some planning issues, such as infrastructure
and strategic growth, above district and county level and to set
targets for growth including housing delivery. Regional Strategy
housing targets were seen as the means of delivering the previous
administration's national target of 240,000 net additional dwellings
per year by 2016 leading to 2 million new homes by 2016 and a
further 1 million by 2020.[4]
The purpose of RSSs was succinctly summarised in
written evidence by Denton Wilde Sapte:
The RSSs were intended to provide a framework for
private investment and public sector planning. RSS policies provided
an evidence-driven, strategic focus for spatial planning decisions.
The need for a regional tier of policy arose as a result of the
difficulties experienced by local planning authorities in both
dealing with strategic applications and putting in place a coherent
planning framework to deliver major urban extensions. The RSS
system was welcomed, initially, by both the development industry
and third sector agencies with interests in conservation, sustainability
and social justice.[5]
RSSs bridged the gap between local planning issues
determined by local planning policies and nationally-determined
policy aspirations, such as housing or renewable energy. As West
Coast Energy wrote, "every region had to play its part in
reaching targets which were set."[6]
Views of regional spatial strategies
7. Our written and oral evidence was mixed on the
benefits of regional spatial strategies. Although there has been
public opposition to regional planning encapsulated in RSSs, there
has also been support for its comprehensive, strategic view of
planning across the different regions.
CRITICISMS OF RSSS
8. Both the process of creating RSSs and their outcomes
have been criticised. Cristina Howick, from planning consultancy
Roger Tym & Partners, described them as "impossibly complicated
and expensive to do".[7]
However, the main objections to them have come from those concerned
with protecting the green belt and locally cherished land from
housing development. Chris Skidmore MP, for example, wrote that
"[i]t is only due to the imposition of 32,800 homes in the
local area under the south-west RSS that the green belt has come
under threat from being bulldozed".[8]
Ron Morton, from the Shortwood Green Belt Campaign, told us that
there was no RSS in the South-West because "35,000 people
objected to the South-West RSS, so there must be something wrong
with it for that level of people to object".[9]
He criticised the gap between the proposals in RSSs and the views
of local communities:
We are the people to whom things are done by planners.
We don't have an input to the whole process. For example, my hamlet,
which is 80 houses, is part of the parish of Pucklechurch. Pucklechurch
has produced an excellent parish plan, which said there should
be no building on the green belt land between Pucklechurch and
the urban sprawl of Bristol, although there should be building
within the village itself, because it recognises the need for
families there to keep the school going, to keep the shops going—all
those things. We need growth, but not this encroachment onto the
green belt. So, what does the RSS produce? Building on the green
belt. What did the planners in South Gloucestershire Council want
to pursue? Building on the green belt.[10]
The Theatres Trust wrote that RSSs were "ineffective
and inadequate" in providing cultural provision in the regions
and that "the Theatres Trust has had far more success in
advocating the protection and promotion of cultural facilities
at a local level with individual local planning authorities in
consultation with their local theatres and theatre groups".[11]
9. Opposition to RSSs in practice and in principle
was summarised in general terms by DCLG's written evidence, which
concluded:
It is clear from this level of opposition that Regional
Strategies did not reflect local community aspirations. But the
opposition generated has also meant that Regional Strategies were
badly delayed and expensive to produce. The delay and uncertainty
meant that they failed to provide a clear basis for planning and
investment decisions.[12]
When he gave evidence, the Secretary of State described
his view of RSSs: "I think the Spatial Strategies were mean
in spirit and there was an assumption that things would always
go wrong".[13] He
also argued that they were ineffective, at least as far as housing
was concerned, saying "We want to see more houses built.
We do not think that the Regional Spatial Strategies delivered
them, because it really was about ticking a box and going for
an ambitious target and it did not really matter. There were no
consequences for not doing that other than that your target increased".[14]
BENEFITS OF RSSS
10. Other evidence points out that the RSS process,
though flawed in many respects, did provide a means of involving
a wide cross-section of interests in drawing up a planning strategy
that dealt with issues covering different local authorities. The
Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) wrote that there
was much to praise in RSSs and they "were the product of
close co-operation between local authorities and other interested
parties".[15] This
point was also made by the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI),
which described how local authorities themselves wanted policies
included in RSSs that would benefit their local areas, policies
that involved, for example, renewable energy, sub-regional sport
and recreation, biodiversity and regional parks.[16]
11. Evidence from researchers Graham Pearce and Sarah
Ayres highlighted RSSs' contribution to the consistency of planning
across the country given the slow emergence of Local Development
Frameworks.[17] John
Baker, from Baker Associates, told us about the positive aspects
of RSSs, specifically the focus on decisions about unpopular planning
issues:
I think people would see a lot of good things in
regional planning. Fundamentally, they meant making decisions
where there was an unwillingness to make decisions, particularly
about unpopular things. The very good thing about them was that
they established strategies and dealt with the relationship between
settlements and places, but the fundamental opposition has been
because they deal with housing numbers [...][18]
Cristina Howick, from planning consultants Roger
Tym & Partners, argued that even the housing targets were
not simply imposed at regional level, but "were subject to
an enormous amount of back-and-forth negotiation. They were not
just a top-down set of numbers."[19]
12. Providing a sound, solid evidence basis for planning
decisions was identified as one of the strengths of RSSs. Brenda
Pollack, from the South East Forum for Sustainability (SEFS),
held out a copy of the South East RSS and spoke impassionedly
about the document and the process:
This is the South-East Plan—10 years of work
has gone into that. I don't know about the officers from the Regional
Assembly when they heard it was being abolished, but I nearly
wept, although I was just on the periphery of influencing some
of the sustainable development policies in there, some of the
renewable energy, the technical work that went into not just the
housing figures but the capacity of the region for renewables,
and where waste was going to go. All that evidence was fed into
this final document, and I think that some of the stuff that's
gone now—that's completely a void—needs to be brought
back and seriously considered by the Government, rather than wasting
resources trying to develop them through Local Enterprise Partnerships
or whoever in the different variations of bodies, where there
might be gaps in between them. All that good evidence is still
there. It may be that it needs updating, but it shouldn't go to
waste.[20]
CONCLUSION
13. Our evidence was mixed on the benefits of Regional
Spatial Strategies. There has been public opposition to regional
planning encapsulated in RSSs, particularly arising from the length
and complexity of their preparation, the difficulty of influencing
their outcomes and the housing targets they contained. There has
also been support for their comprehensive, strategic view of planning
across the different regions. Such a strategic view of planning
often involved necessary developments that were unpopular at a
local level, such as waste disposal, mineral working, accommodation
for Gypsies and Travellers, and energy projects. There has also
been considerable agreement within regions to secure a positive
strategic approach to natural environment issues, such as wildlife
protection. The
Government must ensure that the beneficial and positive aspects
of RSSs, in particular for integrating infrastructure, economic
development, housing, data collection and environment protection,
are not swept away, but are retained in any new planning framework.
3 http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/planningandbuilding/pdf/147399.pdf Back
4
Ev 149 Back
5
ARSS 100, Denton Wilde Sapte, para 1.1 Back
6
ARSS 121, West Country Energy, para 3.4 Back
7
Q 1 Back
8
ARSS 84, Chris Skidmore MP, Kingswood, para 3 Back
9
Q 112 Back
10
Q 112 Back
11
ARSS 130, The Theatres Trust, para 6 Back
12
Ev 149 Back
13
Q 286 Back
14
Q 276 Back
15
ARSS 122, RSPB, para 2 Back
16
Ev 88 Back
17
ARSS 60, Aston and Bristol University, para 2.1 Back
18
Q 2 Back
19
Q 5 Back
20
Q 144 Back
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