Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025

Overview

Royal Assent: 18 December 2025. The landmark planning reform legislation. Described as “seismic planning reform” addressing sluggish processes blocking growth. Enables two headline targets: 1.5 million homes in England this Parliament, and 150 major infrastructure decisions by Parliament’s end.

The Impact Assessment (IA) projected £3.2bn Net Present Social Value over 10 years (potential high: £7.5bn). NSIP pre-application timelines had nearly doubled from 14 months (2013) to 27 months (2021). The Green Book was simultaneously reviewed (2025-26) to improve value for money appraisal of capital spending decisions.

Five reform areas

1. Infrastructure reforms (NSIPs, grid, transport)

• National Policy Statements: mandatory 5-year review cycles; “reflective amendment” process targeting 1-year update timelines (down from ~3 years)
• Judicial review: one attempt for cases without merit (reduced from three)
• Grid connections: “First ready, first connected” replaces “first come, first served” — directly enables Clean Power 2030
• Long-Duration Energy Storage (LDES): Ofgem must establish cap-and-floor scheme (8+ hour discharge capacity) — mandated minimum revenue certainty
• Non-water companies can build reservoirs as NSIPs
• EV charger approval: weeks not months; £45–130 vs. £500–1,000 per approval

2. Planning system improvements

• LPAs can set planning fees reflecting delivery costs — addresses £362m annual funding shortfall
• National delegation scheme for planning committees; mandatory training
• Spatial Development Strategies (SDSs) across combined authorities, county councils, unitary authorities
• Pre-application consultation: ~12 months reduction in timelines

3. Nature and development integration (Nature Restoration Fund)

• Natural England prepares Environmental Delivery Plans (EDPs) for strategic conservation
• Developers make standardised contributions (not project-specific assessments)
• Mandatory BNG for Nationally Significant Infrastructure from May 2026
• Marine Recovery Fund: compensation for offshore wind effects on MPAs
• SoS approval required; success criteria and enforcement provisions

4. Development corporations

• Enhanced flexibility on geographical scope and infrastructure types (including heat networks)
• Cooperation duty with local transport authorities; SoS direction power if collaboration fails

5. Compulsory purchase order reforms

• Expedited land vesting; hope value removal extended to town/parish/community councils for affordable housing
• Electronic notice delivery; simplified newspaper requirements

Key financial figures

Item	Value
Economic injection (10 years)	£7.5bn projected
Net Present Social Value	£3.2bn (IA central estimate)
Water sector investment enabled	£104bn
Community benefit (pylon communities)	Up to £2,500 over 10 years
Planning fee shortfall addressed	£362m annually

Problem statement (IA)

• NSIP pre-application timelines doubled to more than four years in the last decade
• Slower and more costly to build economic infrastructure in England than France and Italy
• No new reservoir built in over 20 years
• Last Parliament was the worst for living standards in modern history; planning reform is essential

Green Book Review (2025)

Simultaneously revised to: simplify structure; reframe value for money and benefit-cost ratios; remove “evaluation” from the appraisal guidance subtitle. Now 88 pages (down from previous). Provides the appraisal framework for all major infrastructure investment decisions including the £725bn infrastructure programme.

Outcomes claimed

• housing-1-5-million — 1.5 million homes enabled by planning reform (Spring Statement estimates +30% housebuilding by 2029-30; 170,000 additional homes; +0.2% GDP)
• clean-power-2030-outcome — Grid connections reform and LDES mandation are critical enabling conditions
• flood-resilience-outcome — Reservoir building by non-water companies unlocked; LDES and energy infrastructure enabled

Assumptions and risks

• PIA received Royal Assent December 2025 — most provisions require secondary legislation or implementation guidance; no delivery yet
• Nature Restoration Fund is a new mechanism; Natural England must prepare EDPs for each site — capacity constraint not resolved
• “First ready, first connected” depends on NESO being able to clear the 739GW queue; the queue reform process is NESO-led, not directly in the Act
• SDSs are a new planning tier; combined authority and county council capacity to produce them is untested
• £362m planning fee shortfall is significant — if fees are not set at adequate levels, the planning bottleneck persists

Tensions flagged

• housing-biodiversity — Both housing and energy use Nature Restoration Fund and EDP process; Natural England’s capacity to run EDPs for multiple sectors simultaneously is not guaranteed
• planning-timelines-2030-targets — Clean Power 2030 and biodiversity 2030 targets need infrastructure decisions now; PIA only in force from December 2025 with implementation still ahead

Source files

• raw/planning-delivery/planning-infrastructure-act-2025.md
• raw/planning-delivery/planning-infrastructure-bill-guide.md
• raw/planning-delivery/planning-infrastructure-bill-ia.md
• raw/planning-delivery/planning-reform-working-paper-2025.md
• raw/planning-delivery/green-book-review-2025.md