But planning is mired in delay after delay – it is beyond painful.
Often criticised for being inflexible and a constraint on development, the system ultimately restricts supply. Developers are usually met with opposition from local communities and must navigate complex conservation areas, listed buildings and concerns from under-resourced local authorities.
Record cuts have seen planning departments suffer severe lack of funding, with talent leaving the sector to work for private planning consultancies. They also face the brunt of providing additional infrastructure and services to new developments.
We are seeing great schemes being delayed at local level, only to be granted approval on appeal at the higher planning courts, meaning the months of waiting was unnecessary.
Some applications are kicked back due to windows being slightly too big, dumped back to the bottom of the pile instead of being approved with conditions. It is chaos.
I have even heard recently of a town council turning down its own application.
When it comes to decisions on land, the political nature of it is there for all to see – there is pushback in many authorities where a ‘not in my back yard’ mentality exists. Labour’s plans state they will write to authorities to ask them to redesignate land.
Despite a pledge to hire more planning officers the reality is that this idea, and any new building schemes put forward, will still be dealing with the same town planners and the same system causing the same delays. Even the targets are broadly similar.
There needs to be root and branch overhaul. The Labour party need to strip politics out of planning.
Instead, we need faster and smarter decisions at a local level and a national planning framework with a non-political body to drive it forward.
The urgent need is underlined even further with homeowners hoping and praying for interest rate miracles to happen.
The BoE, which I believe has sat slightly on its hands when it has come to rate cuts, issued more notes of misery recently when it unveiled statistics showing the millions of mortgage holders are still yet to face the pain of higher rates due to fixed interest deals which are due to end over the next two and a half years.
This mortgage rise time bomb, it outlined, will hit the 3mn homeowners who are still paying interest rates of less than 3 per cent, with most of those still on cheaper rates seeing those deals finish by the end of 2026.
