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March’s Market Insight Report is now available

There was a total of 60,285 applications submitted through the Planning Portal in March 2023.

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Planning news – 13 April 2023

Our planning news is published in association with The Planner, the official magazine of the Royal Town Planning Institute.

Inquiry reopened into controversial prison
The Secretary of State for the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has decided to reopen a planning inquiry for a new prison in Leyland, Lancashire.
Lee Rowley, The Planner

Council in the South East submits local plan
Dover District Council has submitted its local plan to the Planning Inspectorate for examination.
Laura Edgar, The Planner

Land bought for Porthcawl waterfront regeneration
Regeneration proposals for Porthcawl’s waterfront that include hundreds of new homes have moved a step closer with the Welsh Government’s confirmation that it has purchased parcels of land on the seafront.
Roger Milne, The Planner

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See the location plan feature in action 

Following our regular updates about the introduction of the location plan feature, we can confirm that this latest enhancement to the Planning Portal will be available from 2 May 2023.  

To support the guidance provided in our webinar last month, and in previously published articles, we are sharing a demonstration of how easy the location plan feature will be to use, in part one of our walk-through videos. 

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Planning news – 30 March 2023

Our planning news is published in association with The Planner, the official magazine of the Royal Town Planning Institute.

National park to implement scheme to restore biodiversity
The South Downs National Park Authority is introducing a scheme to restore biodiversity and deliver nature-based climate action.
Laura Edgar, The Planner

Planning Portal announces location plan creator tool
Users of the Planning Portal’s new tool will be able to draw their own site boundaries rather than sourcing a map provider when preparing applications.
Ben Gosling, The Planner

Cardiff City Council commits to £800m council house programme
The capital has committed to spending £800 million on a high-quality, low-carbon affordable council housing programme.
Roger Milne, The Planner

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Addressing invalidation due to location plan errors

In this instalment detailing future enhancements to the Planning Portal, we look at application invalidation, why it’s an issue, and how we will help to overcome it with the introduction to the service of the location plan feature.

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Our response to recent consultations

Planning Portal are staying up to date with the current influx of government planning consultations, to ensure that we respond where relevant and identify where future updates to our content and online services may be required. 

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Biodiversity net gain regulations to come into force in November 

Please note: This is an older article on biodiversity net gain. To find out the latest information, please read our current blog post on the subject.

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Local Authority changes from 1 April 2023

A local government reorganisation that takes effect on 1 April 2023 will see structural changes to Local Authorities in Cumbria, North Yorkshire, and Somerset. These will all see the current, separate, district and county level authorities replaced by new larger unitary ones. 

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Planning news – 23 March 2023

Our planning news is published in association with The Planner, the official magazine of the Royal Town Planning Institute.

Housing minister announces skills boost for planning authorities
Housing minister Rachel Maclean has announced the allocation of £1 million in funding to recruit more skilled planning professionals to local councils.
Laura Edgar, The Planner

Hunt announces 12 ‘refocused’ investment zones
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has committed to establishing 12 investment zones in the Spring Budget (15 March).
Laura Edgar, The Planner

Ports need adapting to deliver floating offshore wind
Eleven UK ports need to be transformed ‘as fast as possible’ into industrial hubs so floating offshore wind can be rolled out at scale.
Laura Edgar, The Planner

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Upcoming service charge increase

Our annual service charge increase normally happens on 1 April but has been delayed this year and will be introduced at the same time as our new location plan feature in early May.

This new feature is the next big change to tackle the main causes of invalid applications. The first of which was the introduction in 2018 of the standard payment service for all planning applications in England. This saw a major improvement in efficiency and reduction in the number of applications invalid due to a missing fee.

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