A thoughtful piece in today's Telegraph from the RSPB's acting head of sustainable development, Simon Marsh, who was one of 4 individuals asked by government to create a draft of the new proposed planning bill. His insights into that process, and what then followed once civil servants got their hands on the draft, are revealing.
Here’s an extract:
Our challenge to the Government is for it to show how it can effectively simplify and reform the planning process in a way that does not undermine that vital environmental protection. It is only when it can do this that the public will be convinced that these reforms will truly deliver for people, the economy and the environment.
Quite so – and "environment" here has to have a breadth of meaning that includes what people in their local communities actually value on a day to day basis: the things that give meaning and hope to their lives.
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