Labour Manifesto (Planning Blog)

The Labour Party has unveiled a string of planning related policy proposals in its 2010 election manifesto, launched today.
The manifesto, A future fair for all, written by energy secretary, Ed Milliband, sets out a series of initiatives in areas including housing, climate change and environmental protection.

Along with a pledge to build up to 10,000 council houses a year by the end of the next Parliament, Labour promises more power for local councils "in the provision and financing of social and affordable housing".

However it also contains plans for cuts in regeneration budgets. The document says: "Our regeneration policies have transformed previously neglected communities, and our great cities are among the best in the world.

"We will make savings in regeneration funding and focus on tackling worklessness, transforming the prospects of those areas most disconnected from the wider economy."

The manifesto also says it will improve the lot of rural areas by improving transport and internet connections.

It says that councils must ensure that the importance of local services to the community is taken into account before granting planning permission to change their use, and it "will strengthen this to protect viable shops, pubs and community facilities."

On protecting the natural environment the manifesto says competing pressures – from greater food production to housing and natural flood defences – are making the management of land resources ever more challenging.

It says Labour will "introduce a new framework for managing our land that can more effectively reconcile these pressures.

"We will put forward new areas for protected landscape and habitat status, focusing on green corridors and wildlife networks to link up existing sites. And we will commit to increasing the area covered by forest and woodland."

On climate change the manifesto warns on Tory proposals to reverse planning reforms. "Failing to deliver on our renewable energy targets, reversing our planning reforms and giving up on our new industrial strategy, they would put Labour’s low-carbon revolution in jeopardy", it says.

The manifesto reaffirms plans for a high speed rail network and Labour's support for a third ruway at Heathrow but adds that it "will not allow additional runways to proceed at any other airport in the next Parliament."