Media & News
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Localism Bill receives Royal Assent
The Act was signed off by the Queen following eleven months of parliamentary scrutiny.
The Royal Town Planning Institute congratulated ministers on improving the Bill but said “the real test of the Localism Act would be its implementation and the resources made available to enable the planning system to deliver it”.
The institute has called for more work on arrangements for safeguarding existing local plans and arrangements and on a planned period during which local authorities, the public and the development industry can “learn to work with the new regime and implement it in the most effective way”.
And it said it would “continue the debate” on strategic planning and will support the development of effective practice even though the “duty to cooperate” has been strengthened.
RTPI president Richard Summers said: “Many issues still need to be clarified, some by legal challenge and others through guidance, but the key issue will be to reduce the continuing uncertainty, cost and delay for the planning system and the development industry.
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Cameron’s Victory in U.K. Referendum Weakens His Liberal Democrat Partners
The U.K.’s governing coalition is set to enter a new phase of “businesslike” relations, ministers said, after voters rejected an overhaul of the voting system, a victory for Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron at the expense of his Liberal Democrat deputy, Nick Clegg.
Sixty-eight percent of voters in the May 5 referendum sided with Cameron against the new system that Clegg backed. That was after the Liberal Democrats suffered their worst local-election results since the party’s formation in 1988, while the Conservatives made gains.
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TFA London office moves to Westminster
After a record 2011 – in which the company achieved a number of significant wins in both the residential housing and commercial sectors as well as adding value to long-term existing projects – TFA has moved the London office from Wandsworth to Westminster.
Vic Angell, the company’s managing director, said of the relocation: “The move will allow us to be closer to our London-based clients, to Members of Parliament that we meet on their behalf and provide more accessible facilities for those coming to meetings with us in the capital.”
The new office is at 50 Broadway, opposite the St James’s Park tube station and half a mile from the Houses of Parliament.