Comment On The Budget From Carl Dyer, Head Of Planning At Irwin Mitchell

The announcement today that planning rules will be eased to allow home-building on empty sites and that the Chancellor will inject £650m to be introduced over the next four years via the Future High Streets Fund- to allow towns and cities to "redevelop under-used retail space into homes and offices” has been cautiously welcomed by planning lawyers at Irwin Mitchell.

Expert Opinion

"At last: a sensible planning proposal, albeit a modest one. With the retail sector under pressure with the rise of on-line retailing, it makes sense to look at other uses for the many empty shops around the country. As we have a national housing crisis, converting redundant shops to homes is a “win-win” proposition: assets which are no longer used can be converted to address a separate problem without putting pressure on Green Field land.

"As shops tend to be in centres or at least local parades, these will be sustainable homes, normally well served by public transport. Adding residents to the retail mix will also improve security in many areas.

"All that said, this alone is not going to make a major difference to the housing supply figures. 2017 was a bad year for retailing, with nearly 6,000 shops closing. Not every vacant shop will be suitable or viable for housing use. Even if as many as half of the 2017 losses were to be converted, that would only be an extra 1% towards the government’s 300,000 a year housing target.

"It will be interesting to see whether there are size limits on the shops which can be converted.

"And also, whether any form of “Prior Approval” is proposed. Hopefully not: if local authorities are given the chance to consider parking or other issues, some will seek to use that to prevent the erosion of shopping frontages. These proposals will work best if there is a straight forward and simple amendment to the General Permitted Development Order- to allow a change of use from Class A1 Retail Use to Class C3 Housing Use (and, of course, any necessary building or engineering works needed to effect the change).

"Other announcements in the Budget such as £500m for the Housing Infrastructure Fund, designed to enable a further 650,000 homes to be built and new partnerships with housing associations in England to deliver 13,000 homes certainly seem steps in the right direction. However we await to see the finer detail on these and along with Oliver Letwin's report issued today."
Carl Dyer - Partner