the Edge has responded to the consultation by both completing the, unsatisfactory, questionnaire and by sending a letter with key points to the Secretaries of State for Levelling Up, Housing, and Communities and Energy Security and Net Zero expressing the following concerns:

1.     That the incremental tightening of fabric improvement measures has been brought an end far too soon

2.     The need to tackle embodied carbon in construction and buildings has been intentionally and worryingly omitted and should have been included

3.     The Future Homes proposals barely mentions the challenge of retrofitting existing homes

4.     Selecting Primary Energy over Delivered Energy as the main metric for assessing compliance makes it impossible for building users to easily monitor

Net zero provides a clear long-term policy environment that will generate beneficial economic activity and growth through a much needed decarbonisation programme that reduces both demand and cost. This will, in turn, produce much sought after exportable skills and trade opportunities for UK service providers.

The UK has huge potential for renewable power generation as a result of its geography. If exploited and combined with increased development in energy storage capacity this could lead to the extraordinary triple win of economic growth, energy security and net zero electricity production.

in response to the Call for Evidence on Land use planning in England the Edge has stated that Planning is an essential mediator between the market and those who live, work and rely on the land and in its built and natural environments. Planning is capable of taking the longer and wider-term view that markets do not necessarily need to worry about. We have been dangerously operating with a half-functioning system of land use planning for too long and reform is now overdue. Land use policy should be a means of building bridges between departments, disciplines and interests, fostering collaboration and cooperation in order to achieve the Public Goods it is well capable of delivering.

Recommendations include:

• That an effective and easily accessible (for all) land use strategy is put in place as a matter of urgency as an essential tool for good governance. It should be backed up by an effectively public information campaign and the introduction of a digital, data-rich mapping resource .

• The Treasury Green Book Annex A1, Non-market Valuation and Unmonetisable Values section on Environmental and Natural Capital, and its associated DEFRA guidance Enabling a Natural Capital Approach, or the principles they embody, should be used as part of the appraisal of all land use proposals.

• Reform needs to be handled jointly by local and national government, but requires a reinvigorated/reinvented/re-resourced local government system in order to thrive.

• Land use planning needs to be agile and responsive and able to continuously to adapt to changing circumstances. Departmental silos must be discouraged from developing that might stymie the necessary adaptability.

the Edge welcomes the strategy and states that:

• There needs to be more certainty of funding and an agreed, deliverable programme for the retrofitting of the education estate

• It is vital to have a carbon performance verification of the school estate

• Climate and ecological literacy must be included throughout the curriculum at primary, secondary, FE and HE

• There are more jobs and careers than ‘green skills’ which will benefit from climate and ecological literacy

• There can be no place for ‘business as usual’ unless it means normalising better behaviour .

the Edge has recommended that:

• there should be a size limit on buildigns that could benefit from permitted development rights

• the permited development right should not apply to areas of outstanding natural beauty, World Heritage Sites and conservation areas

• issues including climate, local infrastructure, basic housing standards, protecting high streets, planning obligations and consultations should be considered

the Edge believes that:

• The climate and biodiversity emergency needs to be the overriding focus of any proposals for changing the planning system.

• Any changes must be closely co-ordinated with more ambitious and well-enforced building regulations and infrastructure delivery.

• Actions to deliver both mitigation of and adaptation to global heating are essential

the Edge has a particular interest in hydrogen (H2) as a potential future energy carrier for buildings because it fundamentally changes the current market direction of travel for what is naturally a very fragmented sector.

Summary points

The proposals:

-        lack joined-up, systems-level thinking.

-        have the appearance of being driven by vested interests

-        ignore who pays for the duplicate zero carbon energy supply networks required

Simon Foxell of the Edge gave evidence to the National Policy for the Built Environment Committee of the House of Lords on 10th December 2015.

Links:

1. Lords Select Committee on National Policy for the Built Environment

2. See the Video recording here.

Read:
Building Better Places - Report of the Committee 2015-16
Edge submission to Select Committee on the National Policy for the Built Environment, October 2015
Notes prepared for the Selected Committee session - December 2015
A supplementary note about the workings of the Cambridgeshire Quality Panel, December 2015