Government refuses to pause permitted development roll-out

The government has rejected pleas from an influential committee of MPs to pause the roll-out of further permitted development rights to convert properties into housing, which campaigners say have seen the creation of thousands of sub-standard homes.

In 2021 the cross-party Levelling Up, Housing and Communities select committee had called on the government to “pause any further extensions of permitted development rights for change of use to residential”, including by halting the move to allow all commercial premises to convert to homes – which was subsequently introduced.

The committee had also called for the government to conduct a review of the “role of permitted development rights in the planning system”.

Permitted Development Rights (PDRs) are permissions for certain specified activities granted by central government which then mean a developer can go ahead without securing further planning permission. Previously used primarily for small works such as household extensions, the government has introduced a series of more significant rights to create new homes without planning permission from 2013 onwards, with a further big expansion in PDR in 2021.

Since being introduced the new PDRs have been responsible for the delivery of 93,301 new homes by 2022, according to official data, but critics have said many of these are poor quality and in the wrong location because they have bypassed local planning processes.

In a much-delayed response to the select committee, that has just been issued, the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Department responded to the request for a pause by saying it believed that “permitted development rights can continue to play an important role in the planning system alongside our wider planning changes” and that “We continue to […] look at where new or amended rights could support key government agendas”.

The department added that it believed the recent addition of “prior approval” criteria into the new PDRs around design and space standard meant homes produced should be good quality.

While the department said it kept PDR policy “under review”, its response did not commit to the formal review of the successes and failures of the policy called for the by the select committee. It also refused to commit to allowing local authorities a route to protecting their retail town centres from conversion of business parks into out-of-town retail development, saying the point of permitted development was that it was a “deregulatory tool” designed to provide “maximum flexibility in support of high streets and town centres”.

Clive Betts, chair of the select committee, said he would meet with other MPs on the committee to develop a formal response in due course, but that the government’s stance was “disappointing”.

“It’s disappointing they haven’t paused their roll out and haven’t committed to undertake the analysis of the policies that we’d asked for.

“This government has a real problem of doing things without proper impact assessment either before or after the policy has been rolled out.”

The MPs’ report had said the government’s roll out of PDRs, particularly its decision to allow all Class E premises – which include nearly all commercial premises such as shops, offices and restaurants – to convert to housing, had been taken without “sufficient evidence”. The government has also recently introduced permitted development rights to allow the demolition and rebuilding of commercial premises into new homes.

This has happened despite a government-commissioned analysis of the first wave of PDR finding that they created worse homes “in relation to a number of factors widely linked to the health, wellbeing and quality of life of future occupiers”.