The Mineral Products Association (MPA) has welcomed new amendments to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, but cautioned that reforms to mineral planning are also necessary to deliver housing and infrastructure goals.
The amendments, announced on Tuesday (14th October), would prevent planning consents for housing developments from being timed out, give ministers new powers to stop councils rejecting planning applications, promote the delivery of reservoirs and windfarms, and change Natural England’s role as a statutory consultee.
However, the changes remain silent on mineral planning, despite widespread recognition that a reliable supply of construction materials and industrial minerals is essential to the Government’s ambitions for the built environment, transition to clean energy and economic growth.
Despite historically low sales figures for aggregates in the UK, consumption is still far outstripping new permissions for mineral extraction, largely due to barriers in the mineral planning system, leading to more than a decade of decline in permitted aggregate reserves.
To address the issue, the MPA has repeatedly called for the Government to urgently introduce a mineral planning reform package as a follow-up to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill amendments, to enable producers to extract and supply the essential materials that the bill is intended to facilitate.
Mark Russell, MPA Executive Director for Mineral Resources, said: “With construction output flatlining, the Government’s commitment to building more homes and better infrastructure is of course welcome, but you can’t be ‘YIMBY’ about houses if you’re not ‘YIMBY’ about quarries!
“Planning reform needs to address the barriers to all kinds of development in the construction and manufacturing supply chain, especially the extraction of aggregates on which virtually all other development depends. The current Planning and Infrastructure Bill won’t remove these barriers to delivery; it will simply shift the sticking point elsewhere in the process.
“Without reform to mineral planning, the decline in consented mineral reserves will continue, and ensuring a steady and adequate supply to meet demand will become increasingly difficult with potentially huge economic ramifications. These latest amendments to the Planning Bill must not be the end of the story – mineral planning reform has to be the next step.”
