Two Further Councils Have No Section 106 Monitoring

Two London councils have admitted they have no process in place for ensuring developers provide the social housing that they promise to build. Bexley and Redbridge Councils both told Inside Housing that they have no monitoring process for their Section 106 agreements, a failure for which Southwark Council was censured by the Local Government Ombudsman in November last year. Through Section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act, local authorities can add planning obligations to specific developments. It is often used to require developers to provide a certain percentage of affordable or social housing. Read more on Inside Housing.

Planning Bill Makes Parliamentary Progress

MPs have completed their line by line scrutiny of the Government’s flagship housing and planning bill. The amended legislation has emerged unscathed from opposition attempts to change the measures. The bill will now have its report stage in the Commons on 5 January before being passed on to the Lords. During the final exchanges MPs queued up to urge ministers to ensure planning departments were better resourced, including allowing councils to set their own planning charges. Planning minister Brandon Lewis reminded them that section 303 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 already provides for the Secretary of State to permit local planning authorities to set their own level of fees up to cost recovery. Read more on the Planning Portal.