Independent · Planning, housing and place · England
We read the documents.
Long-form reporting on housing, planning and place in England, written by people who work inside the system. Every number is traced back to the document it came from, and the document is named.
A letter to the inspectors, and the gate it does not reach.
On 6 October the housing and planning minister told the Planning Inspectorate that a universal tilt in favour of permission applies to development the new framework supports. We read eight appeal decisions issued since August. Most turned before any tilt could apply, on whether a site qualifies for support, and inspectors are reading the qualifying words in different ways. At Kingston Bagpuize one found an unmet need, from a very marginal supply and the need for affordable housing, in a district that, on that inspector's figures, passes both of the framework's named tests, with a delivery score of 192%.
Continue reading, 12 min →Private developers build most new homes, and fewer households have a mortgage.
In 2000, 42% of households in England were buying their home with a mortgage. In 2024-25 it was 29%. Private developers still account for almost three in four new homes, and they build at the pace they can sell. Councils completed 2,660 homes last year, against 115,840 in 1977-78, and housing associations completed more than in any year since the series began in 1969-70. This is who builds homes in England now, and who else could if fewer households can borrow.
The cost of building a home is at a record high, the Treasury says, and house prices have not kept up.
The Budget on 28 October says building a home costs more than ever, because of materials, labour and regulation. The cost of new housing work in Great Britain rose 13.6% between December 2022 and June 2026, while the average price of a home in England rose 1.2%. These are the government's own figures for each part of the cost, and what the Budget changed.
What the new Framework says about neighbours, and the design guidance it relies on that is still a draft.
The December 2024 Framework asked for a high standard of amenity for existing users. The August 2026 Framework drops that phrase and adds a test on daylight and sunlight for neighbouring residents. Privacy is mentioned once. The guidance that is meant to fill the gap, on design and placemaking, was still a consultation draft on 29 October 2026, and the draft leaves separation distances to local design codes. Cotswold's 2018 design code sets 22m between facing windows.
Ground Level is a professional editorial platform. Investigative, data-driven, written by industry professionals. Interrogating Britain's planning and economics systems driving housing and infrastructure.
What the standard method is, and what it is not.A formula, a set of inputs, and a missing cap. Three things, in order.
02The five-year supply, the tilted balance, and why your council can't say no.The mechanism that hands control to developers when a council falls behind.
03What "affordable" actually means, and what it costs.The gap between what the planning system calls affordable and what a local worker can pay.
04Viability, density, and why every estate looks the same.The product range, the economics behind it, and a planning system that cannot demand anything better.
05The Local Plan, and why most of England does not have one.The document that decides where houses go, how it gets made, what happens when it fails, and what happens without it.
06Section 106 and the Community Infrastructure Levy.Two mechanisms for making developers pay for what development needs, and why both are under strain.
07The infrastructure that doesn't exist yet.How water, roads, schools, and GP surgeries are supposed to arrive alongside new housing, and why they don't.
08The neighbourhood plan, and what it can actually do.The most democratic tool in the planning system, and the one with the least power when the system is under pressure.
09How land gets its value, and who keeps it.The arithmetic underneath the English housing crisis.
Councils approve 84% of the major housing schemes they decide, a higher share than in 2016. They are deciding far fewer of them. The outline applications coming forward are larger, and four in five major housing decisions now run to an agreed or extended deadline rather than the statutory 13 weeks.
Coming next
Get the dispatch.
Long-form, data-first, independent. Housing, planning and infrastructure reporting delivered free to your inbox.