Council in bid to remove “undemocratic” permitted development rights amid concerns at sub-standard conversions

Reading Borough Council is set to remove permitted development rights (PDRs) which allow developers to convert office buildings into homes without the need for planning permission.

The local authority's lead councillor for planning, Cllr Micky Leng, said that blocking PDRs will help ensure that "all developments go through the democratic planning process".

However, the decision, which councillors are scheduled to take next week (31 October), comes just a week after the Government curbed the attempts of three other councils to block PDRs.

In a statement Reading said it "strongly opposes" PDRs as they can lead to people living in areas considered "wholly inappropriate" as a place to live, due to noise, disturbance and air quality issues, leading the council to "pick up the pieces at public expense".

The council added that flats which were previously office accommodation are "often substandard, poor-quality conversions", with too many of the homes being one-bedroom or studio flats, "completely ignoring" the identified need for different sized homes set out in the council's Local Plan.

It also claimed that PDR is estimated to have cost the town nearly 600 new affordable homes, along with the loss of at least £3.5 in off-site contributions to affordable housing.

The council noted that a further £4m in planning fees and education, leisure and transport contributions, had been lost since 2013.

The liberalised planning rules came into force in August 2021 when the Government created a new class of permitted development, after inserting "Class MA" into Part 3 of Schedule 2 to the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015.

The class permits the conversion of commercial buildings, including office blocks, to housing without planning permission.

Since then, a number of councils have attempted to disapply Class MA for selected areas by making an immediate direction under Article 4(1) of the General Permitted Development Order.

However, the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities retains powers to modify or cancel Article 4 directions. Currently, more than 10 Article 4 directions have been modified.

Last week (18 October), Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council, Harlow Council and Lambeth Council became the latest local authorities to have their efforts to block office conversions curtailed.

In each case, the Government modified the Article 4 direction for either not taking "a sufficiently targeted approach in the assessment of the need to protect local amenity or the well-being of the area" or not taking "a sufficiently targeted approach in the assessment of the wholly unacceptable adverse impacts of the permitted development right in each location".

Reading noted that it had engaged in discussions with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and submitted further evidence to reduce the scope of its original proposals.

It said that while no response has yet been forthcoming from Government, "the DLUHC has advised the best approach is to proceed with the Article 4 Direction, and the Secretary of State can cancel the direction if they choose to".

Cllr Leng said: "Having seen first-hand the detrimental impact the use of these planning laws can have on communities, Reading is now taking a stand".

"Owners and developers have been riding roughshod over the views of neighbours and the local planning process for too many years. Their motivation is profit and they often have little or no interest in the views of people who live in the vicinity of these developments."

He later added: "This is about fairness and ensuring all developments go through the correct democratic planning process, which should be the same process whether you are an owner or a larger developer."

Adam Carey