New inquiry - Abolition of regional spatial strategies

Terms of reference

The Committee has decided to undertake an inquiry into the revocation and abolition of regional spatial strategies. The Committee will be focussing particularly on the implications for house building, especially:

• the implications of the abolition of regional house building targets for levels of housing development; and

• the likely effectiveness of the Government’s plan to incentivise local communities to accept new housing development, and the nature and level of the incentives which will need to be put in place to ensure an adequate long-term supply of housing.

The Committee understands that the Government intends to announce further details of its plans for incentives “shortly”, and would welcome comments on the adequacy and appropriateness of those incentives when the details are available.

The Committee will also be considering:

• the arrangements which should be put in place to ensure appropriate cooperation between local planning authorities on matters formerly covered by regional spatial strategies (eg. waste, minerals, flooding, the natural environment, renewable energy, &c.);

• the adequacy of proposals already put forward by the Government, including a proposed duty to co-operate and the suggestion that Local Enterprise Partnerships may fulfil a planning function; and

• how the data and research collated by the now-abolished Regional Local Authority Leaders’ Boards should be made available to local authorities, and what arrangements should be put in place to ensure effective updating of that research and collection of further research on matters crossing local authority boundaries.

The Committee is inviting written submissions, addressing any or all of the points above, in accordance with the guidelines stated below by Wednesday 15th September 2010.

Please note

Each submission should:

(a) be no more than 3,000 words in length;

(b) begin with a short summary in bullet point form;

(c) be in Word format (no later than 2007) with as little use of colour or logos as possible; and

(d) be accompanied by a covering letter containing the name and contact details of the individual or organisation submitting evidence.

A copy of the submission should be sent by e-mail to clgev@parliament.uk and marked "abolition of regional spatial strategies"

If you are unable to send an electronic version, please send a paper copy to:

Nicola McCoy
Committee Assistant
Communities and Local Government Committee
House of Commons
7 Millbank London
SW1P 3JA

It is helpful, for Data Protection purposes, for contact details not to be included in the text of submissions, but sent separately in a covering letter. You should be aware that there may be circumstances in which the House of Commons will be required to communicate information to third parties on request, in order to comply with its obligations under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

A guide for written submissions to Select Committees may be found on the parliamentary website at: http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-committees/witnessguide.pdf

Please also note that:

• Material already published elsewhere should not form the basis of a submission, but may be referred to within a proposed memorandum, in which case a hard copy of the published work may be included.

• Memoranda submitted should be kept confidential until formally accepted by the Committee. The Committee has authorised the publication by witnesses of their evidence, but such publication should await the formal acknowledgement of acceptance of the submission as evidence to the Committee.

• Once submitted, evidence is the property of the Committee. The Committee normally, though not always, chooses to make public the written evidence it receives, by publishing it on the internet (where it will be searchable), by printing it or making it available through the Parliamentary Record Office. If there is any information you believe to be sensitive you should highlight it and explain what harm you believe would result from its disclosure. The Committee will take this into account in deciding whether to publish or further disclose the evidence.