Calls for Strategic Planning Incentives to Boost Housing

Strong financial incentives are needed to coordinate planning and land use strategically across council boundaries with ‘meaningful penalties’ for councils which fail to do so, according to a new report on how cities could transform house-building performance. That’s the conclusion of the ‘Growing Cities’ publication produced by think-tank the Institute for Public Policy Research and housing charity Shelter, which argues that drastic action is needed to tackle the urban housing crisis. The authors concluded that councils within city-regions “should be strongly incentivised to work closely together to co-ordinate building more homes”. The report argued that strategic planning powers and budgets should be devolved to cities and resources such as public land should be pooled and coordinated across boundaries. Read more on the Planning Portal website.