Planning Policy

Richard Harwood is a planning, environment and public law KC at 39 Essex Chambers. He was awarded Junior of the Year for Environmental and Planning Law at the 2011 Chamber Bar Awards and appointed Queen's Counsel in 2013. In 2014 he was awarded an OBE for services to planning and environment law decision making.He is a member of the Planning Minister's Local Plans Expert Group and a case editor of the Journal of Planning and Environment Law.

The making of planning policy is a major political and legal issue and there is currently a considerable focus by the government in England, Wales and Northern Ireland on local plan policy making.The current climate is characterised by government concern at the slow pace of local plan adoption in England, the controversial introduction of neighbourhood planning, new strategic planning tools with the Planning (Wales) Act 2015 and local development plans in Northern Ireland. Planning Policy is the only book dedicated to planning policy, both national and local and includes coverage of the Housing and Planning Act 2016. It covers the policy framework within which planning decisions are taken. It addresses how national and local policy is formulated, examined and challenged.

Expert authors - one has been appointed by Minister for Housing and Planning as the sole lawyer on the Local Plans Expert Group

PrefaceTable of statutesTable of statutory instrumentsTable of cases1. Introduction2. Legal Principles3. Strategic Environmental Assessment and Habitats4. National Planning Policy - England5. National Policy Statements6. National Waste and Air Quality Policies and Strategies7. Local Plans8. Brownfield Land Registers9. London and Devolved City Regions10. Neighbourhood Development Plans11. Supplementary Planning Documents and other Non-development Plan Policy12. National Planning Policy - Wales13. Strategic Plans - Wales14. Welsh Local Development Plans15. Welsh Supplementary Planning Guidance16. Northern Ireland: Plans and Policies Adopted by Ministers17. Local Development Plans in Northern Ireland18. Marine Planning19. National Agencies' Policies20. Local Policies21. Representations and Examinations22. High Court ChallengesAppendix 1 Town and Country Planning Act 1990Appendix 2 Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004Appendix 3 Planning Act 2008Appendix 4 Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes Regulations 2004, SI 2004/1633Appendix 5 Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England) Regulations 2012, SI 2012/767Appendix 6 Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012, SI 2012/637Appendix 7 Town and Country Planning (Brownfield Land Register) Regulations 2017, SI 2017/403Appendix 8 Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017, SI 2017/1012Index