School of Real Estate and Planning
‘The Neighbourhood
Planning Project in England’
Prof Gavin Parker
LSE, 18th January 2016
© University of Reading 2016
www.reading.ac.uk
• Presentation based on:
Parker, G. (2015) ‘The Take-up of Neighbourhood
Planning in England 2011-2015’. Working Papers in Real
Estate & Planning #06/15. University of Reading,
Reading. pp21.
http://centaur.reading.ac.uk/43545/7/wp0615.pdf
Neighbourhood Planning
• Involved directly in orchestration of NP between 20122014 via RTPI/Planning Aid England
• NP ‘User experience’ published October 2014
• Many issues identified in this & wider lit:
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Speed / delay
Role of LPA
Advice / guidance
Scope
Weight / relationship with the Local Plan
‘Ownership’
Non-participation
• NP as a microcosm of planning issues generally…
• Neighbourhood Planning – Localism Act 2011
• Part of a wider shift in planning:
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Growth
Decentralisation
Hybridity and Fuzziness
Market / private sector role
Foucaultian perspective on neo-liberalisation of Planning inc.
Technologies of:
– Agency and
– Performance
»» contestation at and across scale
• NP offers Bounded autonomy - circumscribed space
• An ‘invited space’ of participation (Gaventa, 2004)
• Neighbourhood plans must be in ‘general conformity’
with the NPPF and the strategic policies of the Local
Plan as prepared by the local planning authority (DCLG,
2012: para. 184)
• Neighbourhood Development Plans and growth:
‘that [NPs] support the strategic development needs set
out in Local Plans, including policies for housing and
economic development’ (NPPF, 2012: para 16)
and that:
‘Neighbourhood Plans and Orders should not promote
less development than set out in the Local Plan or
undermine its strategic policies’ (NPPF, 2012: para 184).
‘In the context of neighbourhood planning, the agency of
individuals is mobilised by the construction of a new
identity as a member of neighbourhood forum. Their
capacity is then redeployed to achieve government’s
objectives which are currently centred on increasing the
rate of house building and development in general’
(Davoudi & Madanipour, 2013: p555)
• Localism Act 2011 has created a distinct spatial
arrangement for the exercise of government – the
neighbourhood:
‘Its manifestation in planning is the assumption that
our capacities can be best utilised if we engage in
neighbourhood, rather…city or regional or national
planning’ (Davoudi & Madanipour, 2013: p558)
• Localism under the Coalition / Conservative party
‘It brings geographical understandings about scale and
place together with sets of political understandings about
decentralisation, participation, and community, and
managerialist understandings about efficiency and forms
of market delivery... It is often intentionally associated,
confused, or conflated with local government, local
democracy, community, decentralisation, governance,
privatisation, civil society etc. for political effect’ (Clarke
and Cochrane, 2013: p14-15).
• ‘Typically’ +2 years
• What is involved in NP (and Who?)
Steps
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Area Forum (the qualifying body)
Area Designation / Parish or combined
Evidence gathering / Consultation / Engagement
Draft plan
Pre-submission Consultation
Submission
Independent examination (and report)
Referendum
• Who is involved?
• NP as co-produced enterprise?
• At least 70% of NDPs involve private planning
consultants (Parker et al, 2014; 2015)
• LPA – ‘Duty to support’
• Gatekeeper role
• Mixed levels of support…
• Lowndes and Pratchett (2012) - communities will
benefit or respond differently and in an uneven way to
the government’s localism agenda,
• Neighbourhoods ‘sinking or swimming on the tides of
localism’.
• Experience of participatory opportunities in the past known variation in capacity across localities.
• Way that NP has been designed / framed…(Gunn et al
2015; Parker et al, 2015)
Who is participating and where?
Take-up and Progress of Neighbourhood Planning Areas (Aug
2015)
NP Activity
NP referendum
Spring 2013
Spring 2014
Spring 2015
Summer 2015
DCLG Forecast take-up
762
1143
1524
n/a
Actual NP take-up
511
1000
1400
1500
(Source: based on DCLG, 2012a and successive ‘NP notes’ produced by DCLG)
NB. by January 2015 - 107 to referendum
1
8
60
80
Region / Qualifying Body (Parish/Forum) Distribution of Neighbourhood Planning (Aug 2015)
NP to referendum:
Parish / Forum / Total
NP Qualifying Bodies*: Parish
/ Forum / Total
0 / 2 = (2)
7 / 68 = (75)
South East
34 / 2 = (36)
299 / 15 = (314)
South West
9 / 0 = (9)
274 / 7 = (281)
West Midlands
9 / 1 = (10)
213 / 5 = (218)
East Midlands
8 / 0 = (8)
167 / 7 = (174)
East of England
7 / 0 = (7)
165 / 1 = (166)
Yorks & Humber
1 / 0 = (1)
84 / 8 = (92)
North West
6 / 0 (6)
83 / 22 = (105)
North East
1 / 0 (1)
41 / 4 = (45)
75 / 5 = (80)
1333 / 137 = (1470)
Region (England)
London
England (total)
Index of Multiple Deprivation breakdown of NP Qualifying Bodies
Region / Pop.
(England)
IMD
IMD
IMD
IMD
IMD
Q1
Q2
Q3
Q4
Q5
London
(8.174m)
South East
(8.635m)
South West
(5.289m)
West Midlands
(5.602m)
East Midlands
(4.533m)
East of England
(5.847m)
Yorks & Humber
(5.284m)
North West
(7.052m)
North East
(2.597)
All
0
1
5
55
14
75
67
165
67
15
0
314
0
81
125
75
0
281
0
77
129
7
5
218
24
70
50
29
1
174
24
74
53
15
0
166
0
22
8
60
2
92
0
35
42
22
6
105
0
0
14
30
1
45
115
525
493
308
29
1470
(7.8%)
(35.7%)
(33.5%)
(20.9%)
(2%)
(100%)
(53.013m)
Totals
Note: based on 2011 IMD classifications and 2011 Census. Q1 = least deprived / Q5 = most deprived.
Experiences
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Burdensome
Support
Needed help
Guidance too vague
Critical of scope and control
Contestation over scope and resistance to the ‘technologies’
Depends where you are, what other plans are in place, what type
of LA you have
• Not necessarily a tool for all – need to ensure that alternatives are
visible and supported
• Objective –led i.e. The right tool and support for the task /
substantive issues faced…
Conclusions
• Particular type of take-up – a mixed game
• Predominately rural – inertias and gains for QBs
• Slow progress – burdensome
• Some areas have adopted NP as a mainstream
approach to local planning
• e.g. Herefordshire, Sussex, Leeds
References
•
Bradley, Q. (2015) ‘The political identities of neighbourhood planning in England’, Space
and Polity, Vol. 19(2): 97-109.
•
Clarke, N. and Cochrane, A. (2013) ‘Geographies and politics of localism: the localism of
the United Kingdom’s Coalition government’, Political Geography, Vol. 34(1): 10-23.
•
Davoudi, S. and Madanipour, A. (2013) ‘Localism and Neo-liberal Governmentality’, Town
Planning Review, Vol. 84(5): 551-562.
•
Gaventa, J. (2004) ‘Towards participatory governance: assessing the transformative
possibilities’ pp25-41, in Hickey, S. and Mohan, G. (eds.) Participation: from tyranny to
transformation? Zed Books, London.
•
Gunn, S., Brooks, E., and Vigar, G. (2015) ‘The Community’s Capacity to Plan: the
disproportionate requirements of the new English Neighbourhood Planning initiative’ pp147167 in Davoudi, S. and Madanipour, A. (eds.) Reconsidering Localism. Routledge, London.
•
Lowndes, V. and Pratchett, L. (2012) ‘Local governance under the Coalition Government:
Austerity, Localism and the ‘Big Society’, Local Government Studies, Vol. 38(1): 21-40.
•
Parker, G. (forthcoming) ‘The Uneven Geographies of Planning in England’, in Bradley, Q.
and Brownill, S. (eds.) Neighbourhood Planning and Localism: Power to the People? Policy
press, Bristol.
•
Parker, G., Lynn, T. and Wargent, M. (2015) ‘Sticking to the script? The co-production of
Neighbourhood Plans’, Town Planning Review, Vol. 86(5): 519-536.
•
Parker, G., Lynn, T., Wargent, M. and Locality (2014) User Experience of Neighbourhood
Planning in England. Published report. October 2014. Locality, London.
• Questions…