DCP + COMPASS Editor Martin Shingler will be leading a surgery all day to answer your individual questions.

Get a complimentary COMPASS expert search of planning appeals (worth £1,375). Recent topics include loss of retail units, housing land supply, and agricultural building conversions. You'll also get relevant extracts from the DCP Manual for policy and legal insights.

You can choose to submit your question in advance for extra research time by simply sharing a summary of your planning situation with [email protected].

A warm welcome to all delegates followed by a thematic overview of the day.

• What impact are policy changes made by the government having so far overall?
• Which changes are already successfully making a difference?
• To what extent is/are government decision-making/policy-making/interventions matching its rhetoric, and where is it falling short?

• What interventions have been made so far?
• What further policy changes can we expect to drive the government’s positive planning agenda?
• What is the government doing to specifically support LPAs and drive culture change?

Q+A

Presentations include:

• Brett Leahy will discuss how Enfield has transformed its services and reduced its decision backlog
• How Richborough has seen positive LPA planning driving better development for Paul Campbell, Chief Executive at Richborough
• Millie Dodd shared how new voices can be brought into the consultation process

Moderated by Steve Quartermain CBE, the panel will then discuss:

• How can this positive culture be created in LPAs? What works?
• What are the difficulties and can it be done with limited resources? 
• What are the implications of reform of planning committees/greater officer delegation?

• Update on latest transition timetables, status of front runners, digitisation timetable
• Outline impact of NDMPs
• Setting out new approach on design and design codes

Presentations include:

• Update on government’s proposals and findings of the Strategic Planning Group from Catriona Riddell.

Moderated by Steve Quartermain, the panel will then discuss the implications of the proposed new tier of strategic planning across England.

• What will strategic plans cover and when will they come in?
• How will they affect local plans?
• What will their role in green belt be and how will they be drawn up?
  

A1: How are digital planning and AI going to change planners’ jobs forever?

Presentations include:

• Harry Quartermain from LandTech shares how planning data and digitisation can improve services and make planning more efficient.

• The opportunities from digital local plans
• The opportunities from combining digital documentation with granular prop-tech data
• What the pitfalls are and how to avoid them

B1: How can you solve the Section 106 delivery challenge for affordable homes?

Presentations include:

• How big is the Section 106 problem and what are the solutions with Anthony Lee, Head of UK Development Viability, BNP Paribas Real Estate
• Sean Ellis discusses how a lack of s106 buyers is hampering development in the real world.

Moderated by Chris Buckle, the panel will then discuss:

• Why aren’t housing associations taking on s106 stock? 
• What are the practical ways this issue can be mitigated through options such as cascade mechanisms, payments in lieu, councils taking on stock etc. 
• Are there other ways out that don’t involve a reduction in the affordable housing offer?

Q&A

C1: How can the sector better plan for employment uses?

Presentations include:

• How LPAs can work at a strategic level to understand demand for employment land with Paul Frainer, Director, Olive Branch Consulting, Former Assistant Director, Greater Cambridge Partnership

Moderated by Catriona Riddell, the panel will then discuss:

•  How do LPAs deliver local growth plans?
• What method should LPAs use to decide how much land to provide?
• How can the developer sector work in partnership with authorities to make the case for employment uses?

A2: How can local planning authorities deliver great services without the funding to match?

Presentations include:

• How LPAs can approach improving planning service delivery with Liz Hobden, Principal Consultant, PAS
• What challenges, change and improvement look like on the ground in LPAs with Gilian Macinnes.

Moderated by Sam Stafford, the panel will then discuss:

• How to foster effective partnership working between LPAs and developers that pays for services
• Delivering truly effective working between officers and members
• What works in terms of running a planning team

Q&A

B2: Grey belt - Will housing development be brought forward under the golden rules?

Moderated by John Bosworth, the panel will then discuss:

• Where are the opportunities for developers? 
• How broadly is grey belt defined? 
• Are opportunities stymied by the requirements under the golden rules?

C2: How can the planning system deliver 150 major infrastructure decisions by the end of the parliament?

Presentations include:

• What do planned judicial review changes mean and are government plans sufficient with Lord Charles Banner KC, Barrister (King’s Counsel), Keating Chambers & Working Peer, House of Lords

The panel will then discuss:

• Is the government delivering on the necessary NSIP reforms?
• Does PINS have the capacity to process the casework?
• What do the infrastructure provisions in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill mean for the sector?

A3: Beyond beauty: How authorities can create amazing places through the planning system and design codes

Presentations include:

• Area-wide versus site-specific: the implications of different design coding approaches with Richard Eastham, Founding Director, Feria Urbanism

Moderated by Rebekah Jubb, the panel will then discuss:

• What the removal of beauty from the NPPF means for planning
• The new role for design codes with the end of authority-wide coding 
• What the design code policy means for neighbourhood planning
• How to embed placemaking and good design into local plans

B3: How will the next generation of new towns be planned for?

Presentations include:

• The planning challenges of bringing forward the Chelmsford Garden Community. Jeremy Potter, Spatial planning manager, Chelmsford Council

The panel will then discuss:

• What is coming up from the New Towns Taskforce
• How authorities in areas selected for New Towns should approach their local plans
• What are the right delivery arrangements for New Towns?
• What are landowners and the private sector’s role in delivery?

Q&A

C3: How to prepare for growth in council CPOs to support housing delivery?

Moderated by John Sayer, the panel will then discuss:

• What are the implications of newly revised law on CPOs, and proposals for further powers
• Will local authorities take up a new mandate from the government to use these powers?

• Where are applicants focusing their energy? 
• Are applicants seeing the next period as a key time of speculative applications? 
• How significant a factor will grey belt be? Where is it located?

Presentations include:

• What LPA response land owners and promoters are seeing and what that means for delivery with Paul Brocklehurst, Chairman, Land, Planning and Development Federation (LPDF)

Moderated by Steve Quartermain, the panel will then discuss:

• How does the new system allow LPAs to maintain the quality of development, and resist proposals on unsustainable locations?
• How can LPAs be positive about growth while maintaining strategic control? 
• How should LPAs respond to grey belt applications? 
  

• What PINS is doing to address the volume of appeals, local plan and NSIP work coming through the system without growing the appeals backlog 
• How inspectors are approaching appeals on grey belt land
• How the new system of sending back local plans at risk of failing the soundness test is working and what it means for LPAs