A New Environmental Approach

On 15 December 2024 the government launched a working policy paper titled "Development and Nature Recovery". It invites views on how the government can meet its environmental obligations and contribute to nature recovery alongside this new approach to housing. This is not a formal consultation and is intended to inform discussions. This paper is part of a series of government working papers on planning reform, more of which are to come in the next few months.

Depending on what comes from the working paper and the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, this is good news for developers and environmentalists alike. The working paper suggests a new approach for how developers interact with environmental law. A suggestion is that there would be one financial payment for developers that would fund a host of environmental obligations. Importantly, this will only relate to environmental areas that are dealt with strategically and there could still be individual environmental assessments where environmental harm is not dealt with strategically. We do not yet know how this financial payment would be calculated or when this will be implemented. 

Ideas and proposals taken forward from this working paper are to be implemented through the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, which Angela Rayner has said we can expect "probably around March". 

Importantly, the working paper makes clear that these proposals will be in addition to biodiversity net gain requirements. The government also suggest that these proposals will be supported by the new environmental outcome reports (EOR) regime launched by the Levelling Up and Regeneration Act 2023, which will replace the current environmental impact assessment (EIA) and strategic environmental assessment (SEA) regimes. EOR has essentially been on hold since March 2023, but as of last month the current government confirmed that we can expect a road map for the delivery of EOR in the coming months. How EOR will be delivered in practice remains unclear.

The government are not aiming to reduce existing law that offers environmental protection but to revise and unify certain approaches such as targeted amendments to the Habitats Regulations 2017 and the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. The goal is largely to change the process of achieving the environmental outcomes and go beyond simply offsetting harm. The government acknowledged that more robust regulatory and policy actions are required to address pollution and environmental harm at its source. 

The government's main objectives are:

1. pooling individual contributions to deliver the strategic interventions necessary to drive nature recovery,
2. unlocking development that is stuck by current environmental law and improve nature recovery at the same time by more than just offsetting, 
3. make it easier for developers to discharge a host of environmental obligations and provide legal certainty,
4. establish a clear framework to monitor delivery of environmental outcomes.

The government have set out three steps to reach its objectives:

1. Strategic action: A single strategic assessment and delivery plans that move responsibility away from individual projects,
2. The right people: Moving responsibility for strategic actions onto the state and suitable expert organisations identified by the state,
3. A unified developer fund: one financial payment that helps fund strategic actions so development can proceed more simply and quickly with project-level environmental assessments being limited only to those harms not dealt with strategically.

To make the switch to the strategic approach, a clear delivery plan will be set out by the relevant delivery bodies for the appropriate areas. The delivery plans will address underlying environmental issues, actions necessary to deal with the environmental impacts, present further environmental uplift where possible and calculate the costs of these interventions to relevant developments. The overall aim is for a more unified, simple and timely experience for developers. 

The current slow and disconnected approach to nature recovery has been evident through the way nutrient neutrality has been dealt with. It has caused issues for developers and local authorities which has resulted in delays in meeting house building targets and delivery. The government hopes that the three key stages set out in the working paper will address this delay, with a strategic approach being especially key. 

We will wait to see what the Planning and Infrastructure Bill does include later this year, but this working paper is a positive step showing that the government are thinking about how the 1.5 million homes target will be reached, whilst also considering the environment and improvements to the planning sector overall.