New chancellor Rachel Reeves used her first days in office to commit the incoming government to reform the National Planning Policy Framework and bring back mandatory housing targets.
She also pledged a new taskforce to accelerate stalled housing sites, naming a number of target plots representing more than 14,000, as well as 300 additional planning officers around the country.
She added that Deputy PM Angela Rayner will write to local planners ‘making clear what will now be expected of them’ including reviews of green belt boundaries and prioritising brownfield and grey belt land.
Meanwhile, Angela Rayner immediately stepped into her new role and announced that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, would revert to its original title of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.
She said: “When they announced levelling up, the last government may not have had the right solutions but they were right about the problem. Because our country is too unequal, and it holds us all back. This government has a mission to tackle that.”
