Planning permission deadlines extended until 2021
The government has agreed to extend planning permission deadlines in England in a move which will support landowners with development interests.
Recent data published by the government estimated that by the end of June 2020, more than 400 residential permissions providing more than 24,000 new homes would have expired since the start of lockdown with builders unable to work on sites.
But following calls from developers, housebuilders, and others in the industry, the government has now confirmed that permissions will be extended.
Permissions set to expire between the start of lockdown (23 March 2020) and the end of 2020 will be extended to 1 April 2021.
For those permissions which have already lapsed before the provisions come into force, they will be subject to an additional environmental approval process before the automatic extension can take effect.
No further detail is available at the moment on what this process is or what it entails.
Overall, this will be a welcome measure to ensure development can still be undertaken without the need to apply for planning permission again.
Hopefully it will provide some relief to those with extensions already expired, or about to, given that construction work was largely halted across the country.
The Scottish government announced it was introducing similar measures back in April.
