RICS provides expert evidence to House of Lords on new town delivery

RICS provides expert evidence to House of Lords on new town delivery, highlighting need for improved public-private sector cooperation

• Long-term political commitment, and public and private funding certainty are essential to deliver viable, resilient new towns
• Strategic planning must align with infrastructure, skills and areas of demonstrable housing need.
• Improved public-private sector relationships are needed to deliver these plans
• Community consultation and integrated delivery models are critical to creating places people want to live, work and thrive.

Earlier this week (Tuesday 3 June), Charlotte Neal, Director of Professional Practice & Research at the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), gave evidence to the House of Lords Built Environment Committee, as part of its inquiry into the practical delivery of new towns, which was initiated in response to the Government’s objective of starting the construction of twelve new towns by the next general election.

The inquiry focuses on how large-scale settlements can be delivered within current planning, economic and political constraints.

In her evidence, Neal addressed a number of points, focusing in particular on the need to ‘de-risk’ schemes to attract long-term private investment.

“We need to create planning certainty to de-risk the process for developers and investors, but it’s really important that the people who are making those decisions are joined up and have a clear vision and strategy for the place that they are looking to create and develop,” she said.

In relation to developers, Neal commented:

“I think there's a perception that developers sometimes sit on land for years just because they can and that's not the reality.

“It can take years for developers to get planning consent and in that time, they're losing money, so it's not always a choice. I think the perception around developers being these big bad companies needs to change, as without them, you unfortunately don’t get the affordable housing in the quantities that are required, or the town centre regenerations. I think there needs to be a bit of a reset on the rhetoric to make developers more inclined to want to work on these projects”.

Neal also warned that blanket affordable housing requirements, referring to the government’s target of having 40% affordable homes in new towns, risks undermining viability:

“We've got material costs, construction costs, inflation, and if the requirements then make a site unviable you then get nothing delivered, whereas if you reduce that affordable amount, then it might make that affordable housing easier to obtain.

“I think it’s also very important to remember we do have a huge amount of existing, sub quality housing stock in this country, which could be regenerated before building new properties. The regeneration of existing homes is not just cost efficient and quicker to achieve, it’s of course better for the environment, reducing carbon output and ultimately helping us achieve our net zero goals for the near future”.

Neal went onto emphasise the challenge of skills shortages across the sector, commenting: “We have a massive skills shortage in this country around construction and delivery and we welcome the news that there are going to be 300 new planners but there are still somewhere around a thousand vacancies that need to be filled across the industry.

Neal also highlighted the need for a built environment GCSE as seen in Wales and Northern Ireland, to encourage young people to consider the industry as a career choice to help bridge the skills gap.

She also highlighted the need to increase public knowledge early on in relation to how these development processes work and what people living in these communities are to expect and the benefits, so they are well informed and less likely to oppose new plans.

The Committee’s inquiry will now examine a number of further issues including enabling infrastructure, social infrastructure, housing delivery and community creation.

RICS will continue to support the committee and policymakers with technical expertise, market insight and standards leadership across the built environment.