The department, which was set up in 2006 in order to help tackle the housing crisis head and deal with legislation concerning building regulations and planning, will be proposing new legislation with regards to freeing up brownfield sites for development. Alongside this the issue of access to finance for SMEs will be discussed which has been central to Regentsmead’s recent Get Britain Building campaign.
James Bloom, CE of Regentsmead commented:
“It’s great to be acknowledged and identified as being central to the development finance industry. Part of our cause this year has been to help reach SMEs in order to get Britain building again. We have found that access to finance is still a huge issue for SME developers as well as good sites for prospective development projects. We look forward to discussing with government officials and helping to tackle these problems head on.”
One of the new ideas to be discussed will be ‘Permission in Principle’ which may act as either a precursor or a replacement in some circumstances for full planning permission, therefore slowing down the tedious process of gaining full planning permission before a development project can start.
James continued to note that: “The permitted development scheme has shown that a bit of pragmatism in government can go a long way in contributing towards solving the housing crisis. Hopefully permission in principle is another step we can take towards this. It has so far proved successful in Scotland and we look forward to debating the intricacies of this proposal in England at DCLG.”
