Ask-a-planorak #10 - Simon Gallagher, Director of Planning at DLUHC

I don’t need to tell you. You’re looped in. Which means you know that anyone who’s anyone has spent the last couple of weeks gabbing about the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. There’s an awful lot for us to process in the bill. But once you’ve read it, you then get to the harder bit: what might this bill actually mean? For the structure of local government. For plan-making. For house-building, and other kinds of development. For compulsory purchase and regeneration. Where do we even start?

Here’s an idea: why not start with the Department’s Director of Planning? Simon Gallagher has been Director of Planning at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities since 2016. He knows this bill backwards (we’ll test him on it at the end), and he is the civil servant now responsible for shepherding it through Parliament.

But how did Simon become one of the country’s chief #planoraks? What does he make of the big challenges that face our system? And how does he think this bill might help solve them? Let’s find out in 10 quick-hit questions:

1.  What was your route into a life as the Department’s Director of Planning?

I joined the civil service in 1993 and have spent nearly thirty years on various thorny economic and social policy issues.  I’ve worked on simplifying pensions tax and on the Turner Commission’s reform of pensions, I’ve led the team on the rescue of Northern Rock, I worked on the Government’s business and labour market support to the economy in 2009-10, I worked in Berlin on the Eurozone crisis, I worked for the Chancellor of the Exchequer on controlling welfare spending.  I’ve been struck how many in the planning world think their system is uniquely complicated and I think my response is that all issues of public policy are complex, because they are dealing with the complexities of the real world.  Compared to tax, welfare, bank regulation etc planning looks quite straightforward to me!

2. When you came into the planning system, if you had to pick one (not an easy task!), what did you see as its biggest challenge?

In common with a lot of relatively small public services it has not yet seized the opportunities of digital service design.  And there is a complex set of market failures around coordination that make it hard to deliver that change.  When you look at what’s happened to passports, tax returns, benefit applications over the last couple of decades, planning looks a bit behind the curve.

3. 196 clauses, 17 schedules and 325 pages – there’s a huge amount to digest in the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill. Which of the Bill’s provisions are you particularly excited by?

As a civil servant I’m not allowed to get too excited by any particular Government policy – though I’m proud of the amazing team who behind the scenes have delivered it.  But for the reasons above I am particularly excited by the provisions that support the digital transformation of planning.  Together with the investment in services and the innovative potential of the sector I think this could transform the way planning works over coming years.

4.  We’re all familiar with stories of some recent struggles to adopt local plans across the country. What in the Bill do you think is most likely to help get that part of the system onto the right track?  

If you speak to a lot of local authorities you hear that many who have tried to Do The Right Thing have found themselves bogged down in process or substance failures to the extent that many have probably thought “why bother”.  The Bill offers a lot of process simplification and removes some of the hurdles such as that Duty to Cooperate that have tripped authorities up, which together with the removal of the 5 year housing land supply test for the first five years of the plan means there is something that the leaders can tell the community about why its worth investing in getting a plan in place.

5. How do you see the role of joint spatial development strategies in the Bill – in particular, do you think absent a legal duty to cooperate, some authorities may require encouragement to undertake these strategies, or indeed joint local plans?  

Most of the Bill is about creating tools for local authorities to use, rather than forcing them in particular directions.  I’ll be interested to see which local authorities want to take up the option of joint spatial development strategies – but my ministers have not set a target for the number they want to see.

6. We’re soon to do a webinar together which asks the question “Will the Bill deliver more housing? Yes or no?”. Without giving everything away (keeping us a bit in suspense for the big day), what are the key parts of the Bill that you think will facilitate housing delivery?

You’ll have to wait for the webinar!  But as my Secretary of State has been saying, the key is to incentivise communities to want development and to reassure on their concerns.  You’ll have seen his BIDEN mnemonic – so its about delivering Beauty through requiring binding design codes, Infrastructure through the new levy and the duty to engage, Democracy through reducing speculative development in the first 5 years of the plan, Environment through the Environment Act 2021 provisions and our new Environmental Outcomes Reports and Neighbourhoods through giving neighbourhood plans formal status in the development plan.

7.  There’s lots of interest in the proposal to drop the current requirement to demonstrate a 5 year housing land supply in cases where local plans have been recently adopted. Without that kind of mechanism, how do you think authorities will be incentivised to grant the consents we need to keep delivery consistent? 

You should sit in the meetings my ministers do with aggrieved MPs and councillors and tell me the current approach works!  The Government is offering a deal to authorities – get a plan in place and there will be less scope for appeal, but also that if you’ve allocated a site in a plan there is a higher bar to meet if the authority wants to reject a consent on that site for the purposes in the plan.

8. We have all heard the stories of desperate resourcing issues facing planning departments all over the country. Beyond the proposed increases to planning fees, what answers do you see to this problem? 

 The brilliant Joanna Averley as our Chief Planner is chairing a working group to look at precisely this issue.  It’s a deep, complex and longstanding problem and neither Joanna nor I think Government can wave a magic wand and solve it.  Joanna’s approach is to get others to start thinking what we can do collectively.

9.          The 2020 White Paper asked us all what three words we associate most with the planning system in England – what would’ve been your three words?

 Passionate, fascinating but inward.

10.       With the ink barely dry on this Bill, it’s no doubt too soon to be talking about legacy! But looking ahead, what kind of impact would you like your tenure as Director of Planning to have had on the English planning system?

I’m not going anywhere yet!! The Bill has a long way to go through Parliament (and incidentally we haven’t had a proper planning Bill since 2017 so if you have any new readers this is a real chance to see your profession debated in Parliament – watch the Parliamentary channel).  I think constitutionally I’m not allowed to have a legacy – the job of the civil service is to advise ministers and to execute their decisions rather than have our own agenda.  But if in years to come people think I played a role in beginning the modernisation of this service, that would be pretty cool.

Thanks so much Simon for those fascinating answers. If you’re interested in that webinar we mention above, you can sign up here. Do join us. And in the meantime, stay well #planoraks. Only a few weeks to official summer. So steel yourselves. Get that sunscreen ready. And, most of all, #keeponplanning.