Local Development Plans (Hansard, 16 December 2003)

§ Keith Hill

Each local planning authority would be required, under the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Bill, to prepare an Annual Monitoring Report. Regulations would specify that the report has to be prepared by 31 December in each year to cover the period from 1 April to 31 March immediately preceding. The authority would need to report on their performance against the published local development scheme and on the impact of their policies on the ground. The authority and stakeholders would need to know what effect its policies and proposals were having in order to decide whether they are achieving the desired

	Floor (Percentage)	Scaling factor applied to grant increase above the floor	Ceiling (Percentage)
Authorities with education and social service responsibilities	4	0.9411240	7.5
Single-service police authorities, police part of GLA	3.25	0.0100295	25
Single-service fire authorities, fire part of GLA	3.5	0.9181902	5
Shire districts in two-tier shire areas (i.e. shire districts that do not have education and social service responsibilities)	3	0.2287428	50

For 2004–05 these floors will ensure that all authorities receive an increase in formula grant, when measured against 2003–04 on a like-for-like basis, which is above inflation. (Formula grant comprises Revenue Support Grant, redistributed non-domestic rates, and any Principal Formula Police Grant.) The scaling factor and the ceiling have been set so that, for each local authority group, the cost of supporting authorities 856W effect or whether changes are needed. Draft Regulation 48 requires authorities to include information on housing policy and performance.

If the annual report on the effect of the authority's policies or proposals demonstrates that they are not performing as desired this should trigger the authority to revise their local development scheme (and subsequently their local development documents) under clause 25 (revision of local development documents). If they fail to do so, my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister can direct the authority to do so.

Through the planning delivery grant, we are investing an extra £350 million in planning over the three years 2003–06. This will provide local authorities with the resources to deliver an improved, efficient and responsive planning system that takes good decisions in sensible timeframes and delivers the right development in the right places. Part of the grant is top-sliced for local authorities in areas of high housing demand. In 2004–05 we are giving serious consideration to an element of the grant being related to performance in the delivery of housing in these areas.

Through comprehensive performance assessment we make across the board judgments about the quality of the services delivered and management in authorities. We can use it to assess whether there are corporate reasons for any failure to deliver good housing and planning services. It informs us on the nature and scope of any support that might be needed for failing housing and planning services.