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Insights // 09 January 2017

Permitted Development – Office to Residential: An Update

Partner Karen Jones, in our leading Planning & Environmental Law team, provides an update on office to residential permitted development rights.

In October 2015 the then Housing and Planning Minister Brandon Lewis announced that office to residential permitted development rights would be made permanent. There were 17 local authorities who could continue to benefit from an exemption to this rule and who but to do so would need to make an Article 4 Direction before May 2019. The Article 4 Direction, once in place would have the effect of preventing residential permitted development rights applying in designated part of their area or the entire borough depending on the terms of the Direction. 

Currently, where a local authority wishes to make an Article 4 direction that authority must refer the direction to the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State can, if there are objections, refuse to approve or to approve but modify the direction.

During the third reading of the Neighbourhood Planning bill in the House of Lords Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Department for Communities and Local Government and Wales Office) announced that the intention was that where a local authority can demonstrate it is meeting 100% of its housing delivery need the Secretary of State will not seek to limit any Article 4 directions restricting the current permitted development right for office to residential conversions. The local authority will further need to demonstrate it can continue to meet its housing needs after the removal of the permitted development right. This latter requirement is a safeguard for housing delivery as it is reported that in the year up to March 2016 over 12,800 homes came from the use of these permitted development rights. 

If the local authority is unable to demonstrate it is meeting its housing delivery need it is unlikely that an Article 4 Direction will be allowed to proceed and office to residential rights will as a result become more widespread. 

The housing delivery need will be based on a yet to be detailed “housing delivery test” as proposed in the Housing White Paper in February 2017.

Lord Bourne further confirmed that the proposed increase in planning fees by up to 20% as announced in the Housing White Paper would also apply to fees for prior approval. 

For further information or legal advice, please contact law@blandy.co.uk or call 0118 951 6800. 

This article is intended for the use of clients and other interested parties. The information contained in it is believed to be correct at the date of publication, but it is necessarily of a brief and general nature and should not be relied upon as a substitute for specific professional advice.

Karen Jones

Karen Jones

Partner, Planning & Environmental Law

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