The Conservative Party has revealed plans to shake up planning laws if it wins the general election.
Installing features such as a bespoke conservatory or orangery could become easier under a Tory government thanks to the party’s plans to eliminate red tape regarding planning laws.
In its Open Source Planning paper on revamping regulations, the Conservative Party revealed that “the entire bureaucratic and undemocratic tier of regional planning” will be abolished.
This would lead to the elimination of the Regional Spatial Strategies, the Regional Planning Bodies and national and regional building targets, which the party feels are impediments.
The opposition party said it will allow people to change the use of buildings to a certain extent without planning permission by amending the Use Classes Order.
“We will reform the existing planning appeals system. We will make the system symmetrical by allowing appeals against local planning decisions from local residents, as well as from developers,” said the party.
Current regulations require homeowners to inform their local authority before installing extensions such as a conservatory.
Tags: conservative party planning policies, Conservatories, Conservatory, Orangeries, planning permission for conservatories
Before too many people rush to congratulate the Tories on what a first glance seems to me to, to be yet another popular (daily?) pre-election headline grabbing announcement, remember the planning laws are in place primarily to protect each and everyone of us from the unregulated lunatic excesses of our neighbours.
Heaven help us if the plain tasteless or the bullying sort who are motivated by pure spite are to be empowered!
On the whole the planning laws work well,albeit more slowly than we would sometimes wish. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
Well we know who you’ll be voting for then. All this will be irelevant however. Id the Tories get in and cut and slash public spending straight away, they could plunge us into austerity times, and if that happens you can say goodbye to demand for conservatories and orangeries altogether!
I haven’t made my mind up who I’m voting for, but I can guarantee to you it will NOT be the Tories.
”…I can guarantee to you it will NOT be the Tories.”
Is that the ‘northern’ in you RCG!? : )
Re: Planning Laws
What we need is more efficiency, a far quicker turnaround of uncomplicated planning applications, ’small works’, such as Orangeries and conservatories.
It’s just crazy the council set themselves a target of seven weeks to rubber stamp basic applications…particularly at a time when many companies would appreciate the work far sooner, or at least know when an application is refused – thus giving a better idea of their pipeline.
As we all know the planning laws have already been relaxed, which in many cases has been advantageous.
The biggest challenge we are faced with is completely altering the process on larger scale applications, with huge companies, like Tesco, having councils in their back pockets. Many high streets have been blighted with hideous Tesco stores – their logo never being toned down to seamlessly flow sympathetically with the surrounding architecture as well as many small downs virtually ‘closing’ with the increase in out of town superstores (compensated for by large sums of money legitimately being passed to councils for improvement or creation of local ‘amenities’ and better infrastructure… in itself not a bad thing, were it not to be grossly abused)
On a different but related note, councils allow companies to install appalling looking windows (subjective I accept) into properties located in attractive conservation areas thus spoiling the overall feel and charm of many quaint English streets…now this is a whole can of worms!
Edward – no, I don’t think it’s because I’m Northern. It’s more because I like to do the opposite to everybody else.
Mathew, vote for the tories, its like going back 13 years, you get a smarmy git for P.M. who you can bet will set himself up for life, still, if you do the opposite to everybody else, that means you probably will vote. I can’t decide which if any of the waster deserve a vote.
Personally I don’t think the Tories will win the next GE outright. I think it will be a hung Parliament. They had a huge lead and then completely wilted when the recession came. It showed a lot of people how incompetent and misguided they were.
I’m with Ed Burgess on this one. Conservatory/orangery applications should be turned around much quicker. I would say 3-4 is long enough.
Yes, you could be right!
I love the rules round here.
If you were not sure if you needed permission you could enter a form which the planners would advise. the new rules saw the end to that , they now charge £70 for looking at your scheme and give you an approval certificate if you don’t need planning permission!. You then get a £70 credit if you need full permission .
If you walk into the office the duty officer is obliged to advise FOC
One thing that does annoy me is the amount of change for change sake even before they have had the time to assess the affects of the previous change , most gov depts are guilty of this , and the cost of this beaurocratic mess is horrendous.
As soon as a dept changes it’s name or tales a different responsibilty they just have to mess with it
evidently councils lose money on domestic planning applications . . . we all appreciate this is likely to be down to the old PPP
P*ss Poor Planning = P*ss Poor Profits
Happy POETS day…
The planning process may be being simplified …but…. if conservatories , orangeries etc are brought under the envelope of part L then will they require full regs or just glazing regs . ie 1m footings , cavity trays into external house wall, 3 inch cavity, reinforced slabs inspection fees etc , I think people may choose to build real rooms if they are looking for more house space, as a conservatory may start to look expensive due to regulation .
There is a counter argument that says ALL conservatories should be subjected to planning consent, and certainly a much stronger adherence to building regulation than at present.
It has always been the case and continues to be so,that vast savings can be made on the actual quality and method of base work undertaken. All too often bases are constructed that consist of not much more than a scraping of topsoil removed with a slab of concrete poured over.
Scant regard is paid to a host of important building criteria, and widespread abuses are rife. Such as : inadequate surveying of the prevailing site soil conditions, insufficient depth of trench excavation, the concealment of drain access covers, existing drains not protected from new weight bearing walls, no consideration given to future access of other utility services, minimal (or no)underfloor insulation, existing air bricks blocked up, storm water drained into foul water courses, non use of cavity trays in exposed brickwork conditions, cheap flashband used instead of lead, to name but a few.
Its not hard to see why some would prefer little or no control at all to remain. Quality work costs money.
IMHO the Conservative parties proposals would undoubtedly led to yet more abuses and probably mean even more work being lost from the regulated sector to the cowboy sector. Bizarrely this would also mean a corresponding fall in tax revenues for the government of the day – surely not what was intended!! Thats the trouble when people of little practical experience form a half baked policy on the back of a brown envelope for what at times can seem like little more than ideological reasons,without applying any logical thought to the consequences.
Speaking as someone who has lost work to cowboy outfits,(and pays income tax,Vat and corporation tax)maybe its time the public were stopped being sold the illusion that a conservatory can always be a much cheaper alternative to a ‘proper extension’.
Bring on a level playing field for all.
”…maybe its time the public were stopped being sold the illusion that a conservatory can always be a much cheaper alternative to a ‘proper extension’.”
Absolutely right Ian – for years we’ve advised customer who are looking to compare extension versus conservatory in terms of price that it is unlikely the conservatory would cost less and in many cases they work out more (unless on the rare occasion the extension is specified with top end windows/doors etc).
In terms of relaxing planing rules, I am simply keen to improve the efficiency for ’simple’ works … it ought to be a given that best practice is exercised by customers chosen contractors. Obviously I realise a lot of companies in our industry take short cuts in order to ‘fit within a budget’ and it normally means insufficient/incorrect detail underground. (Too many companies in our industry are simply interested in turning over money with little realisation of their overheads… before finally coming to an abrupt end)
I look forward to BSI introducing a kitemark for conservatory installations – similar to the one for survey and installation of window and door sets. This would provide customers with an independent benchmark.