Roberta Blackman-Woods, Shadow Minister for Planning, responding to the Government’s announcement on changes to planning rules, said:

“Planning should be about designing places that people want to live and work in, where there are environmental and leisure amenities and where quality of life is high on the agenda.

“But today’s announcement shows that the Government still think that planning is something that is done to local people, and not something that they have any say in.

“These plans are not only unhelpful but also misguided and appear to be nothing more than another attempt from Government to shift the burden for their failures onto Councillors.

“Unlike the Government, Labour wants to empower communities, putting them at the heart of decision making, with neighbourhood plans being central to a new streamlined system of plan making.”